Mad Tidings
by WolfButler
Summary: The festive season rolls around quickly in these parts and not everybody is feeling so jolly about it. On the back of "A Kindred Christmas", life hasn't quite finished with the Butlers yet - there's always someone trying to ruin any possibility of a nice, quiet yuletide. With extra helpings of bullets and baubles, here's your yearly dose of explosive gruff!fluff. May Contain Magic.
1. Prologue

**So. Hello again. Welcome to what seems to be becoming the traditional, annual, end of year, Wolfy fic. It's the sequel to last year's 'A Kindred Christmas', so welcome back to those of you who read that. (Remember when I said I would try to get it finished 'over the next few days'? Ha. Ha. Who believed me on that? Because I didn't believe me. _July_ , if you're interested. That was when it got done. Christmas in July.)**

 **Those of you that haven't, feel free to binge-read that first one if you like. If you can't be arsed, I entirely understand and this should work as a standalone just fine.**

 **So here we go. In celebration of the release of the Artemis Fowl Movie Teaser Trailer, here is my next 55K+ word fic.**

 **Enjoy. Buckle up. It's gonna be another bumpy ride.**

 _ **WARNINGS: strong language from the start, violence, bloodshed, guns and badassery throughout.**_

 _ **DISCLAIMER: Colfer's characters if you recognise them from anything that might get made into a film one day, mine if you only know them from me.**_

* * *

 **PROLOGUE**

 **'SUITED AND BOOTED'**

 _ **Definition: Ready for something big**_

 **Fowl Manor, Dublin**

"I wish to take him along, is it really that much to ask?" snapped the eleven-year-old, a little impertinently, it had to be said.

"Timmy, dear – your father has spoken," said his mother. "And besides, you'll have the Simmons' daughter to talk to."

"As you have said," Artemis sniffed, haughtily. "And which is _exactly_ why I wish to bring along some _preferable_ company."

"Don't be so rude, young man! Sophia is an intelligent and interesting young lady and I expect you to be a perfect gentleman when you meet her."

"I suppose you do, as it is no doubt your and Father's intention that we fall _madly_ in love and join the two households in an excellent business deal within the next half decade, I'm sure!"

"Artemis," his father said sternly, catching the last of the conversation as he came into the room. "You know full well that this social event is to solidify the Fowl-Simmons partnership, but I can assure you, you will not be expected to _wed_ anyone this evening – only to be civil. Now whatever is the matter with you?"

Artemis jumped at the sound of his father's voice, but he turned to plead his case anyway.

"Junior, Father – I would really like to bring him along."

"Whatever for?" the Fowl patriarch scoffed. "Really, I know you have _quite_ the colloquial relationship with the boy, but must you really insist on taking him everywhere with you? The Major is your bodyguard, _not_ Junior."

Artemis felt his cheeks flush red, but he continued more in spite than anything now.

"I just wanted some company my own age…" he muttered.

"Then your point is moot; Sophia is _exactly_ your age – Junior is much younger."

"A mere few years! And if you insist on picking fault in my argument; my own _gender_ , then!" Artemis said, exasperatedly. "Really Father, I imagine in a few short years I will _greatly_ appreciate your insistence that I interact with the opposite sex, but for now all I'm asking is that Junior accompany us to the theatre so that I may enjoy some decent conversation should Sophia prove as _monumentally_ boring as I expect!"

"Artemis!" his mother gasped.

"No, no, Vivienne – it's quite alright," Eugene said, seemingly amused. "Fine, Tim. You can bring Junior. But you can ask Butler yourself. And I must warn you, he is of a _quite_ sensational disposition this evening."

"And why would that be, Father?" Artemis asked, simultaneously pleased, yet irked with the conditions relating to his success.

"He isn't so thrilled with who Simmons will be bringing along to keep _him_ 'company', either," his father chuckled.

* * *

 **The Kitchen, Servants' Quarters, Fowl Manor**

"… I told him, but _no_ ; four guards they're bringing. _Four!"_

Myles rested his chin very lightly on his clasped hands and leant on the table with his elbows.

"I mean, they only have three charges between them! Surely to God if you need more than a one to one ratio that says something about the level of training of your security team."

Myles dared to half-close his eyes and went to the happy place he visited on the occasions when his father was ranting and he was, joyously, not the subject of his displeasure.

Alexandr continued, regardless, pacing up and down the staff's kitchen as he went on.

"So of course, that's _four_ resumés to check – and I can tell you they are not worth the paper they are written on. There's maybe _one_ who will have half an ounce about him, but the others are **_duraki_** for sure."

And Myles knew his father _would_ be sure. He had probably run a full background check on all four of the guards, both Mr and Mrs Simmons and their preteen daughter. He didn't often let _any_ unscrutinised persons within a ten-metre radius of his charge and family and even then, it was only because the aforementioned principal had neglected to tell him of a meeting. He _certainly_ wouldn't allow anyone to sit near them for the duration of an operatic Christmas production without thoroughly investigating them first.

"So now not only have we got to watch out for an entire other family of charges, we've also got to watch the backs of some downright _civilian_ bodyguards! We may as well bring bloody Harson to make up the numbers! We may as well bring _Kingdom_ – he'd be more use than that uptight fu… Are you listening to me, boy?"

"Yessir," he said, swiftly, sitting up sharply. "And we are to, actually. Now that you mention it."

"Are to _what?_ " his father scowled, sitting down opposite him at the wooden table with an irritable thud.

"Bring Dom."

"Bloody hell _fire_ …" Xandr threw up his hands in annoyance. "And you're telling me this _now_ because…?"

"Sorry," his son shrugged. "Artemis just told me about half an hour ago. I have a feeling he was supposed to be telling _you_ directly but bottled it. You have been a little… ah… fractious, today, Pa."

"I'll give you bloody _fractious_ …" the elder Butler grumbled. But he relaxed somewhat, taking a breath and calming himself. It was not like him at all to be so ill-tempered, but something wasn't sitting right with him with this job and he had long since learnt not to ignore a gut feeling when he had one.

"He said he'd discussed it with his father and managed to convince him to let Dom tag along. I know Mister Fowl wasn't keen, but you know what Artemis is like," Myles gave a placating shrug.

"Probably talked him into a lobster pot and Eugene gave up arguing with him in the end," Xandr snorted. "Have you told the boy?"

"That he should consider a career as a barrister?" The Major said, with an amused huff. "Yes, I have actually."

"No, not him – the other boy. _Our_ boy," Butler told him, with just a hint of emphasis on the claim.

The corner of Myles's lip curled up in a half-smile. The older man was more proud of that kid than he would admit.

"Oh – no I haven't yet."

"Well don't. As much as I love the lad, he's just another fly in the ointment on this occasion."

Myles kept his face stoic, but his heart sank a little; his father was not a man easily swayed once he had made a decision.

"I can't be dealing with another charge when there's already so many other distractions to be going on with," he justified.

"I understand," his son nodded. "I'll just tell Artemis it wouldn't be practical."

"Exactly. I know he'd be good, but even _I_ haven't got eyes the back of my head…"

There was a silence Myles instigated and for once his father fell into the trap of filling it.

"I suppose I should count myself lucky they're expecting you to attend too."

Myles nodded in agreement at the veiled compliment, focussing intently on straightening the salt and pepper pots in front of him.

"It wouldn't be appropriate to take him," Xandr scoffed after another moment. "What would he go as? Can't exactly tell Simmons and his team we just fancied a family outing!"

"I agree," Myles shrugged at last. "I'll make sure Artemis doesn't kick up a fuss… although he was planning to bring him along as a 'friend', I think."

"A friend? I mean, he does well with all the airs and graces bullshit they expect from him, don't get me wrong, but Dom couldn't pass for a Bartelby's brat if he tried!"

"Well, I was thinking of letting him have his Christmas present from me a little early," Myles told him nonchalantly. "To help him play the part."

"What's that? That gun holster I'll bet Theresa won't be pleased about when she finds out?"

"Not that – although you're right, she isn't," Myles admitted. "You remember I took him with me when Artemis was being measured up for the suit he's to be wearing at the Yule Ball?" he asked.

Xandr grunted a response. "A suit?"

"Yes, well – Dom was curious…"

"When is he not?" the boy's grandfather said, a little fondly, a little exasperatedly.

"… and Artemis suggested he get measured up too."

"He's not all bad, your charge," the Butler admitted. "A little too conceited and belligerent at times, perhaps. But his heart is in the right place if he lets it be."

"Quite," Myles agreed. "Well, short story is I spoke to the tailor afterwards on the phone and he still had the measurements in his pocket. So… Dom has a suit."

"What kind?" he said, after a moment.

"Black two-piece. Similar to our standard set," Myles shrugged. "I know how much he likes to be like us."

"Is it protective?"

"The panels are lined with that new Kevlar material."

"Hmm, the lightweight stuff?" Xandr said with a frown of disapproval. "There's a reason things are heavy-duty, Myles…"

"It's well-tested. Not out on the open market yet, but it's supposed to be very good," Myles shrugged, knowing his father would be suspicious of new technology that he hadn't yet seen proof of use of. "Didn't want to make it too heavy for his first one."

There was another short silence where Myles was almost sure his father was quietly grinding his teeth. Although he must be mistaken, for the man chastised him greatly for the habit quite regularly indeed.

"Alright, fine," Alexandr sighed. " ** _Chestnyy bogam, vy rebyata budete smert'yu menya…_** Go tell him he can come. But bring him down here with the suit – I want to see his reaction."

"Yessir," Myles said, rising to leave.

"Anyone would think it was _you_ that put your charge up to asking, boy," Xandr frowned.

"Not this time, Pa," Myles smirked. "Not this time."

* * *

 **Well, here we go again...**

 **Who's with us?**

 **Ah, I'm not gonna leave this as undetailed as the teaser trailer. I'll just go post the next chapter so you can make a proper decision on it...**

 **Wolfy  
ooo  
O**


	2. Chapter 1 - Bang On About

**Thanks to... well, nobody yet. I haven't really given you chance.**

 **Shout up if you're there, folks. I like hearing from you.**

 **In typical, Wolfy fashion - here we go off the deep end...**

 **Tis the season, after all.**

 **Deep breath.**

 **WARNINGS: the usual - violence, guns, bloodshed, threat, strong language... etc. etc. etc.**

* * *

 **CHAPTER ONE**

 **'BANG ON ABOUT'**

 ** _Definition: going on and on and on_**

 **The Gaiety Theatre, Dublin**

"Pa?"

Stood behind and just to the right of the Butler boy, Alexandr's dark eyes cast his way with a flicker of annoyance. It was hard enough to keep watch over the group without his grandson pestering him. He tried not to get irritated with the boy. It wasn't his fault they were in this ridiculous situation; although he had beamed so widely when he had been given the suit he was wearing, his grandfather had had no chance of changing his mind to the more sensible solution once more. Muttering about 'a right real Cinderella story', he had instructed him to change into it and warned him to behave even more impeccably than usual. Which was why this interruption was irking him more than it should. None of the other guards appeared to be doing much, but he noted that at least his son wasn't distracted. He was stood, taciturnly-faced and stubbornly unimpressed the show going on on the stage below, his stare passing across the room in steady, but unpredictable patterns, just as he had taught him, long ago now.

The Fowls were engrossed in the performance, Artemis perhaps less so, but at least he had thus-far got along well with the Simmons girl – so much so that he had asked if he could move to be seated next to her after the interval. That had annoyed the giant bodyguard as well. He had told the young sir the answer was a firm 'no' and possibly been branded as a cantankerous old coot by the pair, but he didn't care; people were seated where they were seated for a reason. Or standing. He had had to glare disapprovingly at three of the practically _reclining_ Simmons guards until they felt so uncomfortable they had gotten up. Some of the other guards had also gone so far to suggest finding somewhere to 'get a brew' whilst the show played, which the Butler patriarch had almost had to smack them around the heads for on the spot. Luckily the one bodyguard with a little more nous – although admittedly less years under his belt – had suggested they had better stay. One of the older guards had had an answer to that, too; 'Ah come on, Bates – there's two Diamonds in this box, we're just overkill' – to which Myles had curtly responded that bullets passed through people just as effectively if they had proper training than if they had had substandard training and the other security team had fell silent whilst they worked out whether or not that was a rather _thinly_ veiled insult. The bodyguard-talk had passed over the heads of the charges, but Xandr had been forced to refrain from rolling his eyes; his son didn't play nice with others. But then he supposed he had himself to blame for that.

"Pa," Dom whispered again, more urgently, almost going as far to tug on his jacket but thinking better of it at the last moment.

" ** _Chto eto?_** " the giant muttered under his breath at last, tilting his ear towards the boy to hear the hushed response.

And that was it.

He knew no more.

And Dom would never forget the sound of the giant body hitting the floor.

Someone screamed first and then the box erupted into movement.

The first on the go was The Major, of course.

Which was fortunate, as the next bullet was meant for him and thudded into the wall he had stood in front of half a second before.

He hurled himself towards the Fowls, toppling all three from their plush theatre chairs and onto the floor. There may be a few bruises in the morning, but that certainly beat getting a bullet in the head like…

 _Stop thinking. STOP. THINKING._

It was imperative that he silence his thoughts; shut everything down but the essentials.

No emotion. No sentience. Nothing.

Training would take over.

The entire thought process took place in the bare milliseconds he was falling through the air.

"GET DOWN!" he roared, as though that wasn't entirely obvious by the fact that over one hundred kilogram of Butler had landed almost directly on top of them. Still, Artemis attempted to raise his head and his bodyguard planted his palm firmly onto the back of it, pinning him to the carpet and lunging forward desperately with the other arm.

He was not about to lose them both at once if he could help it and Dom had made the near-fatal mistake of freezing in horror at the sight of his grandfather crumpling to the carpet as swiftly as a puppet with its strings cut.

"Pa!" he cried, leaping to his feet.

His uncle's outstretched hand hooked his ankle, pulling back sharply and the boy too, crashed to the floor; the wind knocked out of him. Though that wasn't the reason he couldn't breathe. His breath had already caught in his throat the moment he had seen…

 _Pa, Pa – No! He couldn't… He_ _ **couldn't**_ _be…_

He clamped his hands either side of his head, covering his ears like he had been taught to do in a firefight – _taught by Pa_ – and buried his face down into the carpet, teeth gritted against a barely restrained scream of anguish.

 ** _Tat – tat – tat – tat – tat! Tat – tat -tat! Tat!_**

Bullet's peppered the ornate coving around the box, covering them with dust. But more worryingly were the ones that hit the carpet. Someone was shooting from across the room on their level, but also from opposite and above. The gunfire from the box mirroring themselves across the hall could easily been negated by crouching below the thick wall of plaster surrounding the balcony of the box, but those from above were much more difficult to defend against.

The youngest of the Simmons' guards – Bates, as he had introduced himself as earlier – grabbed his young charge by the arm and pulled her straight out of her chair and into a bear hug – it had been a good job the elder Butler had refused to let her move, for otherwise she would be lying on the floor with the Fowls and Myles would have a _fifth_ person to be responsible for. He slung her through the archway that lead to the corridor beyond and as she went she tripped over the huge arm lying like the bough of some great, felled tree on the floor. There was no reaction from the person attached to it.

"Pa!" Dom cried out again, raising his head minutely to look for any movement, any sign that he might not be... " _Pa!_ "

"Hush!" The Major barked, brutally unsympathetic. But he had to be. He _had_ to be.

Dom knew not to answer back, but he was trembling uncontrollably and his pupils were blown wide. He mouthed wordless horror, shaking his head over and over and The Major had to stop himself from reaching for him and holding him close, just to hold him together.

"Roll to the front," he ordered, shoving him roughly instead. "Stay there until I tell you."

He didn't have time to stop and see if his nephew obeyed, he just knew he would. He had to believe it. With him tucked tight against the front of the box, he'd be safe from gunfire. For now.

Below them, the seating area had erupted into chaos. The screams ebbed and flowed with every fired shot as people scrambled over eachother to the exits. If they just moved in a calm and orderly fashion there would have been no injuries and everyone would have been able to leave quickly and safely, for the rest of the theatre-goers needn't worry about the gunmen – they were aiming solely at one small target area.

Which just so happened to be _exactly_ where the Fowls were.

Myles turned to his charge – _charges_ , now – it was doubtful all three of them would make it out of this, but he'd be damned if he wasn't going to die trying.

"Oh Jesus Christ _, Jesus Christ_!" Eugene Fowl was repeating over and over and The Major had to refrain from telling him to shut up too. "Major, what do we…"

Myles didn't let him finish, eyeing up their chances for a clean exit and making his decision. The longer they sat still, the longer the shooter could reposition for a better shot at the targets.

"Doorway – crawl. Now – all of you!" he said, breaking it down simply for them.

Mr and Mrs Fowl, who had probably not crawled a metre since primary school gym class, began to scramble forward down the aisle between the two sets of chairs, almost over the top of their fallen bodyguard in their attempt to reach the horribly small door that was the exit. The other security team, or what functioning members were left of them, had started to react properly now – _fucking finally_ , The Major thought, viciously – in some semblance of a trained response and had the Simmons covered. Not that they were his responsibility anyway, but less bodies on the floor made for a cleaner exit. They pushed them in a belt-hold movement, almost upright for the corridor – idiots. Bullet spattered into the group, at least one of the bodyguards was winged, another falling toward the archway, landing heavily – the only way The Major knew he wasn't dead was that his voice was suddenly added to all the screaming. At least they were providing canon fodder and buying the Fowls another few precious seconds to make it to the corridor.

Pa had said the narrow exit was a security flaw. He had warned them…

 _It doesn't matter now._

 _Stop thinking._

 _Just go._

They crawled as a group. The Major pushing them on.

"Stay low – stay down!" he instructed, pushing Artemis on ahead of him and shielding him with his body. Although if something happened to him, the entire family were on their own now.

On their own, that was, but for the _idiotic_ security team of the Simmons – the worst injured one of them still _entirely_ blocking the exit as he lay on the floor.

The shooting had stopped. Which was not necessarily a good thing. The sniper was re-adjusting their position, as he had suspected. The shots would come again any moment – and perhaps with even more deadly range.

"Let me past!" he snapped at the Fowls and crawled forwards, pressing himself up onto his elbows and hauling the prone guard to one-side.

"Artemis; wait there. Sir, M'am – make for the exit!" he rattled out, pushing his charges past with his other hand. "Don't look – just go!"

Vivienne and her husband managed to squeeze past him, Eugene unable to stop himself from glancing just once at the prone and bloodied form of his bodyguard, before making the safety of the corridor.

 _Presumed_ safety.

He turned back for his charge, beckoning him towards him. Artemis scrabbled towards him and Myles slung him underneath his arm and made for the exit once more.

He didn't _actually_ know if the corridor was safe at all, he realised grimly.

But anything less dangerous than in direct line of fire was an upgrade from their current situation.

Speaking of which…

He grimaced as he felt the heavy impacts slam into his back, his bullet-proof vest holding for now. He ducked his chin close to his chest and pulled Artemis along under his armpit.

The shot guard had lolled back in the absence of his hold and then began to drag himself forward. He didn't make it far one-armed before he stopped to collect himself.

"Move!" The Major snapped.

He panted, shaking his head.

"I can't…"

The Major growled – he didn't have time for this.

"I said _move it!_ " he snarled, drawing his weapon from his belt so fast that he friction burned the back of his hand on the carpet, and jamming it under the chin of the unfortunate bodyguard.

The man's eyes were white all around; panicked.

 _Just like Dom's._

 _No. Not like Dom's._

Dom would do as he was told _immediately_ because he would have known whatever he was being ordered to do was for his own safety, as well as everybody else's.

 _Goddamn_ _ **amateurs**_ _._

One day one of these imbeciles was going to get him killed.

Just like they had…

 _Stop thinking._

 _Start_ _ **doing**_ _._

He shoved him away by the chin with the muzzle of his gun and thrust Artemis forward by a handful of his suit jacket.

"Go – keep going – I'm right behind you – go!" he told his charge, pushing him forward.

There was another scattering of bullets and _why had no-one returned fire yet?_

The other bodyguard curled himself into a foetal position, at least smart enough to minimise the target. But he was a sitting duck. He'd die right here on the carpeted floor of the fancy seats.

Just like…

 _No._

 _Stop thinking._

 _Damn it._

"No – you too," The Major snapped, slapping him on the back. "Go! _Go!_ "

The last surviving bodyguard in the box – other than himself – must have decided the threat of the Fowl guard was greater than the pain from his bullet wound and with a great effort, scrambled after Artemis. Myles wasn't all heart; the man made an adequate enough meat-shield for the boy and it saved him doing it.

The second Artemis's loafered heel cleared the wall he turned to call his nephew to him. They were alone now. The last ones left alive in the 'kill box' as it had become.

"Junior – come to me. Belly crawl; stay low."

But he wasn't behind him.

He wasn't where he had left him.

"Junior?"

He rolled, his head snapping back and forth frantically, searching for the boy.

And then he saw him; stretched beneath the chairs – reaching out for his grandfather's right hand, gripping it tightly.

No, not his hand – his _wrist_.

The boy was checking for a pulse.

 _Thoughtful, caring… stupid._

"Dom!" he called, reaching for him. "There's nothing you can do – come on!"

He hated how in control he sounded. Hated that he didn't feel anything yet. Numbness. Emptiness. _Nothing_. It would hit later, he knew. Just like it had with Beckett. _No. Stop thinking_.

"Domovoi – _leave him!_ "

And that time he sounded a little more desperate than he had intended to.

The boy let go of the giant's wrist, but he didn't stop there. He crawled a little further, trying not to look at the bloodied face and the lifeless eyes, trying to ignore the coppery tang of gore in his nostrils… He slid his hand into his grandfather's still-warm jacket to where he knew the object he needed was kept, unholstered it with care, then began to crawl towards his uncle without a backwards glance.

Not _that_ stupid, then.

"Good boy," Myles called. "Good boy, keep coming – come on."

The carpet exploded in front of him.

"No, no! Back! Get back!" he shouted, but he needn't have. His nephew had already reversed in a hurried scrabble and taken cover under the chairs.

Myles flipped over, pointing his gun up in the direction of the shooter, but he couldn't see them from his position on the floor.

A bullet pinged off the metal leg of one of the chairs; _far_ too close to Dom.

Myles growled in frustration. He'd have to do it. He rolled, making to crawl to the front of the box where he had instructed Dom to lie before. Depending on how good the shooter was, he'd get a few shots off before one of theirs met its mark.

He paused, looking back once at Dom.

"When I start shooting, you start moving, alright?"

But Dom shook his head. He never moved his mouth, but everything about his body-language screamed it.

 _No, no,_ _ **no!**_

"You can do it, I know you can," he said firmly, checking his gun was primed and taking several quick breaths in preparation.

"Uncle…" Dom implored him, even at his young age knowing the risk he was about to take for his sake. "Please…"

Myles stopped. The boy was right. And he didn't need to see two relatives shot in the head today.

"Right. OK. Lie… Just lie still. Let me," he said, trying to come up with another strategy. "Just let me think…"

And then – finally – someone started returning fire from the archway.

There was a second lull in the bullets coming towards them and Myles beckoned to Dom again.

"Wait a second," he said, not knowing whether or not he was drawing the boy into a trap.

Louder cracks of gunfire from closer by kept the enemy at bay he turned to see who their unexpected ally was.

"Get moving – Mister Major, sir!"

It was Bates.

Thank the fecking Lord the young guard had some sense in him.

He began firing at the ceiling opposite and with every shot that left their side of the room, the shots from the other began to cease.

" _Sir_ indeed," The Major snorted, dragging himself across the carpet towards his nephew. "What do you think of that, eh Dom?"

He grinned at him encouragingly, but Dom didn't even crack a smile. He was gripping the chair's mounting as tightly as possible with one hand, his acquired handgun with the other just as firmly.

"OK, come on – come to me," Myles said, hauling himself across the gap on his belly. The shots had stopped, but that didn't mean he was going to offer up a bigger target. "Come to me now, lad."

But Dom didn't move.

The Major had seen that look before. Never on Dom, but on hostages. That wide-eyed rigidness of someone who had just seen someone close to them lose their life and had no idea who was going to be next.

"You alright?" he asked.

The boy nodded automatically. It was a stupid question.

"Time to move this time, OK?"

He nodded again.

"Alright. Slowly does it. We'll meet halfway, OK?"

Dom nodded, uncurling himself from the chairs and beginning to pull himself towards him on his elbows.

"That's it," The Major said reassuringly. It wasn't his strong-point, he had to say. He stretched his long arm across the aisle between the chairs. " _That's_ it. Just a bit further. Here – grab my hand, if you want? It's OK."

His nephew nodded and, reaching out to him with the hand not clasping white-knuckled onto his grandfather's gun, he began to crawl determinedly towards his uncle. It went against all of his own self-preservation instincts, but the level of trust he had in the man knew no bounds. If Myles Butler said it was OK, Domovoi believed him.

"That's m'boy! Good lad! Come on then," he smiled, dragging himself another half-arm's length across the carpet, stretching his fingers as far as he could towards the boy.

A bullet thudded through his jacket and he flinched away from it.

"Fuck!" he grunted, feeling the sharp bite of pain as his arm snapped back to his side automatically.

"Uncle!" Dom yelped.

"I'm alright, kid," he assured him, then gestured to their cover fire with the open-handed expression of _'what the…?'_. "Damn it, Bates – what are you playing at?"

"I'm on it, sir! I'm on it – just reloading!" the man shouted, darting out from behind the cover for the wall to take another few pot-shots at the sniper.

"Well give me some bloody warning next time – you're going to get us killed!"

"Sorry, sorry!" Bates apologised, clicking a fresh magazine into place.

"Less apologising, more compensating!"

"Yessir!" Bates said, renewing his counter-attack with some vigour.

And then quite suddenly there was an increase in the cadence of screaming from below and the sound of something heavy hitting the floor from a height.

"Got the bastard," Bates grinned. "You're clear to move, sir."

Myles didn't need telling twice. He upped onto his elbows and cleared the space between the two of them in a second. Then he wrapped one hand around the boy's ribs and pulled him in tight against his own.

Together they made for the safety on the other side of the archway, the larger's arm never leaving his nephew's back for a moment.

"Keep crawling, Dom," he said. "Just like training."

The boy took a breath, steadying himself.

 _"Keep your body flat, boy – do you want to be shot in the backside?"_

 _"No, Pa."_

 _"Although theoretically if you're going to get shot, that's possibly the best place."_

 _"Would you care to be a live demonstration of that, Myles?"_

 _"…no, Pa."_

 _"Then shut your trap when I'm teaching the boy."_

 _"I was just pointing out it's a large area of muscle without much risk of organ damage…"_

 _"And_ _ **I**_ _shall point it out with the business end of a Beretta if you carry on!"_

"Dom! Dom – _focus!_ " The Major said, seeing his momentary trip into the past and clicking his fingers sharply. "Look where we're going."

Dom may have nodded or he may just have been that his entire body was vibrating with adrenaline, but he dutifully kept his eyes on Bates's boots as they scrambled towards him. As they neared it, his uncle pushed him ahead, looking back.

The box was clear, but for the body on the floor.

Dom cleared the corner.

Myles looked back.

"Sir?" Bates said, stepping towards him.

"One moment."

"Sir… there's nothing you can do."

He didn't sound unsympathetic. Just… honest.

Myles nodded.

"Right," he said, shortly. "Yep. You're right. There's got to be more than one shooter, Bates. Stay sharp."

"Here," Bates said, offering a hand down to him, his other still aiming his handgun across the theatre.

Myles pushed himself to his knees and took it.

"Thanks."

"The others have gone on ahead. We'll rendezvous at – "

For a moment he thought maybe Bates had overestimated his weight and hauled him too hard, but the man gasped, his hand went limp in his grip and his face went slack in shock as he fell backwards with the impact.

"Shit!"

The Major threw himself forward, landing on the other guard and rolling with him behind the safety of the wall. Bullets hit the plaster for another couple of seconds before stopping. The shooter was efficient. _Too_ efficient.

"Bates!" The Major barked, leaping up off him.

The younger man coughed and spluttered – at least he was breathing - but the Fowl bodyguard's heart sunk when he looked at him.

"Shite… vests," Bates panted, slamming his hand to his chest.

Blood pumped over the lip of his waistcoat, spreading steadily, tracing its shape on the white of his shirt and The Major's brain momentarily faltered as he fathomed if anything else fancied to go wrong that evening.

Pa had had a bad feeling about this job.

And usual, Pa had been right.

* * *

 **Just... bear with me.**

 **I got this.**

 **Wolfy  
ooo  
O**


	3. Chapter 2 - Take Care

**Big thanks to: _Shadow914, shiningpearls, Guest, Fowl Fox, Steinbock and ghost235_ \- great to have you all back on board!**

 **WARNINGS: swearing, violence, threat of violence etc... Wolfy's slightly shoddy medical jargon...**

* * *

 **CHAPTER TWO**

 **'TAKE CARE'**

 ** _Definition_ : _1) to keep oneself safe, 2) to ensure something is done_**

 **The Gaiety Theatre, Dublin**

"Alright, alright…" Myles said, dragging him into an upright sitting position against the wall. "Sit still. Stop talking."

Dom was crouched with his back against the wall, still cradling the handgun. The Major didn't take it from him. If it was giving him some comfort, he didn't see why he should. Hell; the boy might even be able to use it if it came to it. He shot him a look and the seven-year-old nodded once. They didn't need to speak to communicate.

"Well congratulations, Bates," he said, pulling a plastic-wrapped packet from the inner pocket of his jacket and tearing it open with his teeth.

"What d'I win," Bates grimaced. "Lifetime supply of travel tissues?"

"You know what?" Myles said, tugging the other man's tie out of the way, ripping open his shirt and stuffing the white wad of material down the front of the guard's substandard vest. "Survive this and I might even get to like you."

Dom watched one small, pearly, white button from Bates' shirt bounce onto the carpet and roll away. He blinked. He was too young for them to have truly taught him how to react in any given situation, but as a Butler he had automatically gone into 'apocalypse mode'. Nothing matter if it wasn't immediately life threatening. Anything that needed more than a moment's processing was compartmentalised for later. Focus on the present. Stay alive. Neutralise threats.

"High praise… I bet," the Simmons guard mused, stifling a cough.

"Well you should be honoured; I'm using the good stuff on you."

"Good stuff?" Bates hacked, looking down at his chest and groaning.

"These packs. They're not cheap shit like your vest."

"No expense spared for… Fowl guards, eh?" he panted.

"Ah, not exactly," The Major admitted. "My father bought them from a military friend of his."

"You used… them before?"

"No, but he assured him they're _'the future'_."

"Great," Bates grimaced, sounding unconvinced. "I'll let… you know, eh?"

"Well, if they work I can ask him to…" Myles cut himself short. "I'll get more. You got any blood-bournes I need to know about?"

Bates shook his head again. "Clean, as far as I know."

"Good," grunted the Fowl guard, who had neglected to put on protective gloves. He had once worked in a team where gloves were a priority, but currently, the only person he was usually likely to be patching up was his father, or in dire circumstances, one of the charges – and he knew every medical detail about any one of them by heart. He refused to think too much about the possibility of administering medical treatment on Dom. It made him feel... spirally.

"Anything I can do, Major?"

Myles didn't jump easily, but that almost made him leap to his feet from his kneeling position.

"Artemis?! What in hell are you still doing here?" he demanded.

"They… they told us to stay. They took the adults," Artemis explained, stepping out of the alcove he had been told to wait in.

 _And your parents let that happen?_ The Major seethed, pushing one hand on top of Bates' wound and rooting in his pockets again with the other.

"Hold this – pressure, you know the drill," he instructed the bodyguard, pulling out a small, black case from his jacket. "You ok with morphine?"

Bates nodded. "Yep."

"Junior, come here – medi-pack, needle box with the number ten on it. Get it out and pass it to me."

Dom switched out of standby, busying his hands with the zip of the hard case his uncle tossed to him.

"They told us it would be safer if we split up," the Fowl boy continued, hesitantly. He wasn't sure if his bodyguard was still listening to him.

The Major used his teeth to uncap the needle Dom passed him.

"Hold still," he warned Bates as he ripped open the Velcro fastenings of his vest and peeled back the top quarter from the shoulder.

The injured man gritted his teeth, knowing what was coming.

"So we…" – Artemis gestured to the girl with him.

The Major thudded the needle down as indifferently as throwing a dart and pressed the plunger, forcing the liquid into Bates' pectoral. He may have been focused on his patient, but he saw the boy's waving hand looking in the periphery of his vision and turned to look.

"Both of you?!" he exclaimed.

The girl stood with Artemis suddenly realised who his bodyguard was treating and leapt forward.

"Bates!" she cried. "Are you alright?"

"Oh I'm fine and dandy, Miss Sophia. I just…" – The Fowl bodyguard removed the needle with a sharp tug, massaging the pinprick wound with the heel of his hand roughly for a few seconds – "I just don't like needles," Bates assured her – although his immediate coughing up of blood afterwards did little to convince her he was telling the truth.

Myles took stock during the exchange, recapping the needle and pocketing it. Ideally it'd be placed in a sharps box, but considering that getting jabbed with a used needle from a reportedly 'clean' human was _way_ low down on his current list of potential fatal causes, he'd worry about that later.

He had his charge, his nephew, an injured party and that man's charge.

He had two guns – three, including his fath… _nephew's_ gun, four or five including Bates' own, depending how many the other guard carried – and no back-up.

The best he could do was get the children to ground and keep them safe until further help arrived.

And he couldn't very well do that in the middle of a corridor.

"Right," he said, so suddenly Dom's head snapped up automatically in readiness for the next order. "Who's _they_ , Artemis? How many people?"

"Erm… Our parents – both of our parents, I mean... So that's four – and the three other Simmons guards. Although one of them was injured… ah…" Artemis's eyes flicked to his new acquaintance and he bit his lip. "Ah… quite badly. They left him behind. He was supposed to stay with us, but he followed the group shortly after they left."

His bodyguard acknowledged the information and turned back to Bates.

"Your watch have a timer?"

Bates nodded, holding out his sleeve. Myles thumbed the buttons on the edge of the timepiece, setting the stopwatch off.

"Morphine clock – four hours 'til the next shot, you got that?"

"If I make it that long," Bates said under his breath.

The Major slapped him twice on the good side of his chest. "Think positive, soldier."

Then he turned to the rest of the group.

"Right," he said, trying to concentrate on the very many things at once was leaving nothing but one-syllable forms of communication available to him. "All on me. We need to find a room to hole up in."

Most likely the team that was after them would do a sweep of the theatre, but he had a feeling it was not the children that were the targets and with the adults gone… He felt a momentary concern for his father's charge, but dismissed it. His employer had, and he would make it his judgement until further information arose, essentially _abandoned_ his son in an unsecure location. He would never abandon Dom – as well trained as the seven-year-old could possibly be – in somewhere even _half_ as dangerous as the situation they were in now.

 _Dom isn't your son, though. Is he?_

He declined to reply to that mental irking.

"Right, come on. Junior, come here and get hold of Bates's other side, there's a good lad," he said. Orders would make the boy feel better, just as it did him. "You two, stay close."

The Fowl boy and the Simmons girl did exactly as they were told. Which was fortunate, because The Major didn't have a spare hand to grab hold of them with, what with Bates hauling himself steady on one of his arms and his gun taking priority in the other.

"You sure… you're OK, kid?" Bates rasped, as Dom grabbed hold of his elbow, pushing upwards firmly.

"He's sturdy, don't you worry," Myles said, his eyes flicking up momentarily as he visualised the blueprint maps his father had insisted he memorise – and how glad he was now that he had. "OK, let's move. There's a maintenance room coming up – should be third door on the right."

The motley group made their way down the corridor too slowly for anyone's liking; except Bates, who would happily have gone slower if it wouldn't have compromised their safety any more than it already was.

Artemis was at the front of the group and reached for the doorhandle.

"Wait!" his bodyguard barked, pulling Bates over to the wall where he leaned heavily – the morphine was starting to get to work and although the pain was lessening, he was experiencing the unnerving sensation of losing his full alertness. "Let me check it first."

The Major placed a palm against the wood.

"What's he doing?" Sophia hissed to Artemis, who faltered, nonplussed.

"Feeling for vibrations," Dom spoke for the first time since he had left the box.

The Major took a breath and, holding his gun in readiness, twisted the handle.

He stepped inside, eyes alert for any movement. But there was none.

"OK, clear. Get inside."

Once the four of them were through, he closed the door and locked it. Not that it would do much good against someone who _really_ wanted to enter, but if they stayed quiet enough, it might put off a passing sweeper.

The room wasn't very big, but it was rather full. There was a table of cleaning supplies, covered with a plasticky table-cloth. The Major pulled it back, checking the space beneath. Nothing. And barely big enough for two, medium-sized adults to hide under. He opened the tall, metal cupboard in the corner. A mop, a broom, some toilet paper stacked neatly in rows of six... nothing immediately useful. The most interesting thing the room could offer was a wooden hatch which when he opened revealed a dumb-waiter. But it was small. Almost too small for Dom, even. He made a thorough check of the rest of the room, even going so far as to lift some of the cardboard boxes stacked against the walls. Cleaning supplies, mostly. Empty spray bottles, disinfectant and the likes. There was a desk against one wall, tinsel hung around a calendar of half-naked women, but not even so much as a biro to use as a weapon.

He pulled out the chair though, offering to Bates who collapsed into it, gratefully.

"OK. Now listen to me, here's what's going to happen," he said, gathering them all in a circle. "You four are going to stay he…"

"But Major!"

"Quiet, Artemis!" his bodyguard said shortly. "It's important that you _listen_."

"Sorry," the Fowl boy said, very quietly; quite perturbed by the unusual directive.

"Thank-you. Now you four are going to stay here. You're going to lock the door and most importantly you are going to stay _silent_. No talking. No moving. Not just quiet; _silent_. Do you understand?"

"Yes Uncle," Dom said first, the others murmuring affirmatives.

"I'm going to go back out there and see if I can find any of the bast…" he paused, composing his temper. "See if I can find any of the men who are responsible for this. Or, alternatively, your parents. If I don't come across anything, I'm going to make my way to the car and call for back-up from the manor – although no doubt the police are involved by now. Then I'm going to come back for you."

"Major, if I may…"

"What, Artemis? What is it?" he demanded, having no patience at all for whatever plan his young charge was about to suggest differing to his own. Improvements or concerns; he didn't have time for them.

"What will you do if you _do_ … you know, come across... anyone?"

The bodyguard looked at him with his dark eyes.

"My job, young sir," he said. "I'll do my job."

Artemis swallowed. It didn't take much imagination to work out what _that_ meant.

* * *

 **Caretaker's Room, The Gaiety Theatre, Dublin**

The Major had not been gone long when they heard movement outside the door they had locked behind him. They had turned off the desk lamp, but the eerie, green glow from the somewhat pointlessly fixed 'fire exit' sign illuminated above the door cast just enough light to see in shade of grey.

They froze – as if they were not still enough already – and could hear voices on the other side of the wood.

"Whoo! _Aaand_ we've got ourselves a _bleeder_ , ladies and gents!"

There was a sadistic, almost game-show host-like tone to the voice.

Dom felt his heartbeat pounding in his palms.

Sophia closed her eyes.

Artemis steadied himself on the table.

And Bates? Bates just breathed. Slowly. Trying desperately not to irritate his trachea into producing a fateful cough.

"What? What are you jabbering about?"

"Over here – see? Blood. On the wall."

Bates swallowed, turning his hand over very slowly in the half-light. It was sticky and damp. He cringed. _Shit_.

"You think it's The Butler?"

"Nah – I sparked him from across the room, didn't I? Triple points for a headshot, right?"

"Triple points? I'll fucking give you _triple points!_ " the second man snapped. "You fucked up, Forbes. Because of you and your ego McPherson is dead and we're stuck sweeping this whole damn building."

"McPherson got cocky sticking out of cover like that. It was a lucky shot by that young guy. He's no Butler, though – and I'm pretty sure I got him too."

"And what about the _actual_ younger Butler? You _spark_ him too, did you?"

"Dunno."

"So you missed him. Great."

"McPherson tagged him a few times on the floor before he bought it. He's probably dead by now – or he's the bleeder and look at the fucking carpet – no-one with that much blood sieving out of them is lasting long."

Bates licked his lips in the dimness of the room, feeling Sophia's eyes on him.

"Was he still moving when you last saw him?"

"Yeah – so what?"

"So what? A Diamond – a son of _The_ Butler no less – could be hunting us right now and you say _'so what'_?"

There was a silence.

"It was simple. Take out the big ones all at once, leave the trophies for the boss. But _no_ , you had to go bagging big game of your own, didn't you?"

"Still a sweet shot," came the sullen reply. "Never saw it coming."

"Of course he never saw it coming – you started the fucking shootout!"

"Someone had to – you lot were all just sitting there scratching your arses."

"We were waiting for the signal!"

"What signal? Waiting until the little ones had to take a potty break because none of you have the balls to shoot when the kiddies are near? We needed to get the job done. I got it done."

"You're an arsehole, you know that? And yeah, actually – I don't like having kids on my conscience. It ain't right screwing some kids' whole lives up because of their families. Those two posh brats and The Butler's grandson saw the whole thing, man. That's just harsh."

"And?" the shooter snorted. "Kid'll be dead in a coupla hours anyway. They all will."

"You better hope it, or you just set up a grudge match with the next young Butler in ten years."

"Oh give up – I'll kill him now while he's small if you're too squeamish."

The second man seemed to have tired of the conversation about murdering children and turned back to the matter at hand. Which was a pity, for Dom would much rather be sat listening to his proposed future death than experiencing it, as was the likelihood should that door be opened.

"What about this room? If you shot the Simmons guard too, then where are the bodies? I only counted one in the box. Did he make the corridor?"

"Well… Yeah I think so." – there was a short pause – "Like I say, I reckon the other Butler managed to get out. What's reckoning he's in here?"

"He's not."

"How do you know?"

"A Butler hiding in a cleaning cupboard and you harping on about it that loudly without being shot through the door? Not a chance. Do you have any idea how good these guys are?"

"As good as anyone when you put a few bullets in them!" he scoffed. "I dunno what you were all worrying about. That Butler went down same as any other fucker; like a sack of shit."

"You're not taking this seriously enough."

"Alright, alright; what if he stashed the shot guy in here? And what's reckoning that baby Butler is in there with him? You can erase the memory of watching his pappy's head explode personally, if you like."

"You're a sick man, Forbes."

"Shut up and pass me your picks, I know you always carry them."

"Just shoot the doorhandle."

"And bring every fucker with a badge or a gun running this way? I don't think so. Give me the fucking picks, Gary."

There was a rustling and then quite suddenly a repetitive clicking sound coming from the door.

"Shit," Bates breathed. "Right. Under that table, all of you – quickly."

"Bates," Sophia whispered. "What about you?"

"I think my number is already up, miss. Besides that, it's my job to keep you safe. And I haven't exactly done the best of that tonight. So just you hide under that table, cover your ears and let me rectify that, hey?"

The children left Bates in the middle of the room with his gun trained on the door and made their way to the table. Except Dom.

He knew that if the man was any good at picking locks, he had less than thirty seconds.

"Junior!" Artemis hissed, holding the tablecloth back and beckoning him frantically. "Junior, what are you doing?"

The Butler boy made no response but to flare his nostrils angrily at him in warning as he crossed over to the pile of boxes and began to very gently peel open one of the lids.

"Junior!"

He slammed a finger against his lip and glared.

The loudest noise in the room was when he clicked open the cap on the bottle of detergent he had found in one of the boxes and began pouring into the spray bottle he had found in another. It sloshed over some papers, dripping to the floor in the glow from the emergency lighting.

"What are you doing, kid?" Bates muttered lowly, taking the safety off his gun and letting go of the pad on his chest in favour of taking aim at the door.

"Helping," came the quiet reply.

"Get out of the way – you're going to get shot!" Bates growled at him as he stepped between the injured guard and the door.

Dom ignored him. If he was right and the man was as impulsive as his companion appeared to believe, he would open the door _before_ he put down his picks and levelled a gun.

"Kid – Junior – whatever your name is – _move_!" Bates hissed.

But Dom stayed. Gun tucked into his waistband, he had instead in his hand a spray bottle; primed and full. He gave the trigger an experimental pull to gauge, spattering the liquid on the back of the door, then took rough aim.

The handle clicked and immediately opened. Had it not, Dom was thoroughly prepared to duck to the left and let Bates do the defending. But as it was, his plan rolled smoothly into action. Through the widening gap he saw someone crouched, as expected, to _just_ the same height as his levelled spray bottle.

The man's eyes widened in surprise when he saw the movement. Which, fortunately, worked out very well for Dom indeed.

He pumped the trigger of the bottle as fast as he could, shooting jets of undiluted disinfectant directly into the face of his grandfather's shooter.

The man threw himself backwards with a scream and before his companion could do so much as point his weapon at the Butler boy, Dom had slammed the door and relocked it.

"What the hell did you do?" Artemis asked, scrambling out from under the table. "Now they know we're in here!"

"I think they knew anyway," Bates said, shaking his head and tucking his hand back down the front of his vest. "Good job, kid."

"Well now what?" Artemis demanded. "They're not going to be long getting through that door once they stop screaming."

"Maybe not, but my uncle will come back when he hears them."

"You're sure?"

Dom didn't look sure at all. He avoided his friend's eye-contact, staring around the room for anything he could use to help.

"For goodness sake, Junior – leave the guarding to the adults! I know you're trying to help but you're just a…"

"Dumbwaiter," Dom said suddenly, clicking his fingers. His manor misdemeanours had immediately coming to mind when he laid eyes on it. He had used the same trick to avoid the wrath of the junior head of security in the past. Although Harson was not usually out to shoot him… usually.

"Well… I was going to say _child_ , I wouldn't stoop so low to call you _dumb_ , nor merely a waiter. You family's service as bodyguards has been a greatly valued asset of my family for…"

"No, Artemis!" Sophia said, suddenly. "The dumbwaiter – we could use the dumbwaiter to get out!"

The swearing outside the door was beginning to decrease, transforming into guttural seething.

"Are you sure?" Artemis said, eyeing the small box critically.

"Got a better plan?" asked the bodyguard boy.

* * *

 **North Stairwell, The Gaiety Theatre, Dublin**

The Major heard the screaming the floor above and changed direction immediately. Those were adult male cries and he would put money on it not being Bates. Which left either the injured Simmons guard from before, or… someone else. He made for the stairwell he had just come down, flying up the steps as fast as his legs would propel him.

* * *

 **Caretaker's Room, The Gaitey Theatre, Dublin**

"Hurry!" Sophia hissed.

It had been decided that the Fowl heir would go first. Risky, potentially, but he insisted on _not_ sending Sophia first and Dom refused to leave them until last in the room. Bates had solved the petty argument and decided the order for them, as exhausted as he was.

"I can't really fit!" Artemis complained, folding his long legs into the box. "This is _highly_ uncomfortable. And we don't even know where it goes!"

"The basement," Junior said. "It goes to the basement, I'm sure. It probably stops at every floor, but don't get out until it stops completely."

"I swear to God, Junior," Artemis said irritably. "If I get stuck and die in this box I will…"

"Dock my wages?" the boy raised an eyebrow.

"Eleven or more years in advance, yes!" the Fowl heir snapped, but he couldn't elaborate, for at that moment his future employee shut the doors of the dumbwaiter and began to lower the box into the bowels of the building.

It seemed like an age before there was a sudden thump as he hit the bottom. The doors didn't open and for a moment he was panicked.

"Junior!" he called in the darkness. "The door – how do I open it?"

Far above on the second floor, nobody heard anything but the thud of the dumbwaiter's abrupt halt.

"The door…" Junior said after a moment. "He'll be stuck because of the doors. I should've gone down first…"

"Bring him back up," Sophia said. "Quickly – and we can give him something to prise it open with."

"Can't," Dom shook his head. "Might chop him in half if he's getting out. We have to wait for him to send it back up."

"Well what if he doesn't? Those men will…"

Fortunately, at that moment, several floors below, Artemis managed to collect himself, worm his fingers between the gap of the door and the frame and force it open with a kick of his loafered feet. He crashed out into the –thankfully deserted – basement in a pile of indignant coat tails. He coughed, breathing deeply as though he had been stuck in the box for hours, rather than the minute or so he had actually been sat with his knees pressed close against his chest. He slapped his hand onto the button to send the dumbwaiter back up, grateful that the modernised system meant there was no need for him to haul on a rope to return it back to the upper floors.

Still, it took an agonisingly long time to arrive for those still upstairs.

"Are you sure this is safe?" Sophia asked as she too folded herself into the small space.

"Well, we have to sort of guess so since Artemis made it," the younger boy said, and closed the door.

"Have to _guess_?!" the girl yelped.

But it was too late for second thoughts. At any moment, the men outside could decide to start shooting at the door. Dom sent the mini-lift down and waited. While he did, he checked on Bates. They had dragged him from the middle of the room to the edge so that he would have longer to react to an intruder. But he was beginning to succumb to the bloodloss, his head drooping and hand loosening on the grip of his handgun.

"Mister Bates…" he said, jostling him gently.

Bates' eyes flickered open. "Careful how you say that, kid."

"What?" Dom frowned.

Bates chuckled, wincing. "Nevermind. You'll get it when you're older."

 _If you **get** older,_ he thought to himself.

"You get yourself in that dumbwaiter," he said. "I owe it to your uncle to keep you safe, but seems you're doing most the saving."

"I… I can't take you with us," the boy bit his lip. "I'm really sorry."

Bates whooshed a breath through his teeth.

"Don't you worry about me. I'm a gonner anyway."

"Don't say that…" Dom said, his face scrunching in concern.

"No, no – don't you worry about that. I'm looking forward to getting a shot at that bastard that killed your grandpa and me," he said. "You get yourself after those two. God knows you've more sense than the pair of them. People like us, kid… the world needs more people like us."

Dom gave him a nod. "My uncle will be here. He's always gets here. Just… just wait for him. You'll see."

"Aye," Bates nodded, not willing to burst the kid's bubble. "I'll wait. Go on now – get going."

Dom climbed into the dumbwaiter reluctantly.

"Erm… good luck," he said, reaching out and pressing the button to send the lift down, the door closing almost immediately.

"You too, kid," Bates said, then fixed his gaze on the only other exit to the room.

There was a sudden noise from the other side and he smiled.

Maybe the kid was right after all.

* * *

 **Well then...**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**

 **01/12/18**


	4. Chapter 3 - Complication

**Thanks to: _Jolinnn, Steinbock & Spencerblue_ for reviewing. Thanks guys - you make me think it's worth staying up late editing and adding to these chapters before I post them :)**

 **WARNINGS:... eh, the usual. You've got this far, right? Violence. Lots of swearing. Bad guys don't say 'fudge'.**

* * *

 **CHAPTER THREE**

 **'COMPLICATION'**

 ** _Definition: Something, often unexpected, which makes something more difficult_**

 **Upper North Corridor, The Gaiety Theatre, Dublin**

The Major had been cautious enough to pop his head around the corner of the corridor before the rest of him followed, but when he did, all hesitation left him in an instant.

"Just fucking shoot it! Dammit, Gary!"

"You _literally_ just said shooting it would be re…"

"I don't give a fuck what I just said! Shoot the fucking door! I'm going to strangle the little bastard to death with my bare hands!"

"We have no idea who's on the other side of that door! And you're useless for shooting anything when you can't see!"

"Yeah we do – that fucking kid! I'll spray up the whole room if I have to!"

"Look, let's just find a bathroom and get that shit out of your eyes. They're trapped in there anyway, we can come back and…"

"And give them chance to escape? Fuck that!" the half-blinded man spat, his scrabbling hand finding the doorhandle and rattling it viciously. "I'm coming for you, you little bastard – you understand that? I'm going to go for the fucking _set!_ "

"Then you'd better not leave me 'til last."

Even the man _without_ bleach spray in his eyes startled at the sudden appearance of an angry giant in the corridor.

"Put the guns down or I put you down," The Major growled at him. The man – 'Gary' – raised his hands, dropping his weapon and kicking it to one side. He had a bad feeling the large man was going to kill him regardless, but not pissing him off went a long way towards avoiding, or at least postponing, that eventuality.

His partner had other ideas. He rushed forward in the direction of the voice and was met with a punishing kick to the gut. That would normally be quite enough to change the mindset of the average attacker, but this man was enraged. He sailed backwards from the impact of one giant, well-used boot, reaching for his gun mid-fall. The Major shot him immediately, just above the mark his kick had left on the man's shirt. He dropped to the ground, still reaching, spluttering obscenities as he went.

"Hello middle-man," the man rasped, blinking rapidly as he tried to focus on his opponent. "It is you, isn't it? How's your father?"

Myles stamped down heavily on his torso, feeling the man's ribs crack under his boot. Without response, he shot him between his damaged eyes. To the only witness, it seemed he had practically walked through the man like he was nothing.

"You'll stand there – put your hands on the wall. You won't move, unless you want to end up like him," he said curtly to the other man, stepping over the latest of his body-count as though it didn't exist. "If you're not bothered by that, please make your intentions known now; I haven't time to be pissing about and in all honesty you're a complication I could do without, understood?"

Gary nodded violently. He knew the truth when he saw it.

"Junior – it's me, you can open up," he said, rapping on the door.

It took rather a long time to open and once it did, he saw why.

"Bates! Where are the kids?" he demanded. "You – come in here where I can see you. Yes you! _Move_ – get up against the wall and keep your hands where I can see them."

Bates shook his head, breathing rapidly and The Major pushed his compliant captive into the room and pulled his new friend up by the shoulders and sat him upright on the carpet.

"Speak to me – where are they?"

Bates gestured at the wall, exhausted by the effort of dragging himself to the door. "Basement. Dumbwaiter. Those two muppets were… trying to get… in… fuck this isn't fun…"

"Shit," The Major muttered. "For fuck's sake what part of ' _stay put_ '…"

"Your boy did good," Bates told him with a bloody grin. "Sprayed the fucker in the eye with bleach. Smart lad."

"Yes he is," The Major said, hoping he was right. Dom would find somewhere safe to hide with the others until he could find them. It would all depend on Artemis doing as he was told by the boy. That was the trouble.

"What's the plan, boss?" Bates asked, breathing shakily.

"Well, you're staying put. But I got you some company," he said, pulling two thin straps of plastic from his pocket and gesturing his captive over. "Congratulations, complication - I've found you a purpose. I'm tying your hands, but you're to hold this pad against his bullet wound until a medical professional takes over. If he dies, I'll kill you – understood?"

The man nodded rapidly – there was a theme here with the consequences of disappointed this Butler. He remained in some sort of terrified awe as he offered his hands out for binding. It was like being in the presence of some large predator you'd only every before read about in books. This guy was one of the legendaries… And here he was on the wrong side of him. He gulped, seriously hoping the Simmons guard had more life left in him than he looked.

"Major – no, I don't want…." Bates protested.

"The time has passed for what you want, Bates. This man is going to agree to help you, or I'm going to kill him before I leave," The Major said, pulling the cable-ties tight around his subject's wrists. "I usually find any mercy I do have tends to go walkabout after a bereavement. Now what's your name?"

"Ah… G… Gary," stammered the lone enemy.

"Right then, Gary. Hand over the rest of your weaponry."

"My... weaponry?"

"Yes, come on - keep up! Guns, ammo, knives etc.!"

"I... I don't have anything else!"

"Bullshit," The Major barked, beginning to calculate if Bates could manage on his own.

"No! No seriously! Please! I'm just a grunt! I'm just a...!"

The Major slammed him up against the wall roughly and gave him a cursory pat-down. He didn't have time for this, but if he didn't do it then Bates might have no time left at all.

He wasn't sure if it unnerved him more that the man was telling the truth.

"How many of you are there?" he said, tying his hands tightly. "Who sent you?"

"Uh... twelve - well, ten because McPherson was shot and you just... ah..."

"Who sent you?" he repeated, ignoring the man's pointed look at the body on the floor in the corridor.

"I dunno, I swear! I'm just hired in for this job. The boss didn't say, I just..."

"Alright, enough. Stop talking," said Myles. He would just have to take the man's word for it. "Understand what I said about this pad? Hold it. Lots of pressure."

Gary didn't think he'd been under more 'pressure' in his life, but he nodded anyway.

"OK. Got it," he said.

"Good. Now Bates…"

"It's Will," Bates muttered. "My friends… they call me Will."

The Major placed a hand on the back of the younger man's head, supporting it for a moment so that he could look him in the eye without much effort.

"Well then Will, just you hold on. I'll send the first medics I see. Young Sophia needs a guard like you in amongst those other useless shites."

Will grinned, his eyes closing. "What do your pals call you?"

"I'd tell you, but you're not going to die," The Major said, letting his head rest gently on the wall.

Bates made a weak attempt at a laugh and held out his gun.

"Take this – you need it more than me."

Myles was glad he had offered. He was not about to leave an enemy in a room with an injured man and access to a gun – tied or not – but to take Bates's gun was quite an ask with an unknown number of hostiles about the place.

"Thanks," he said, taking it. Then to Gary; "You let him die; don't forget who I am. 'Cause you're going to be watching over your shoulder for me for the rest of your life."

Gary swallowed, increasing the pressure on the wad of bloody material.

"Get a few for me, sir," William Bates said, giving him an unsteady salute.

"Stop with the 'sir' bollocks, Will," The Major said with a smirk. "And don't you worry about that; you'd just better be around for me to tell you the number."

"That's the plan… Major," he said.

"Good man," The Major said with a nod and then, with one last glare of warning at Gary, he stepped over the body in the corridor and closed the door behind him.

Time to go find his boys.

* * *

 **The Basement, The Gaiety Theatre, Dublin**

"Do you think Bates will be alright?" Sophia said into the dark.

Neither of the boys answered her immediately, but after a long pause, Dom spoke slowly.

"I… I think so. He seems like a strong sort of guy. And my… my uncle's medi-pack is… it's really good for stopping bleeding. All he's got to do is hold on for a proper medic now."

"Which could be hours if this place is under siege," Artemis interrupted. "And now The Major has no idea where we are – honestly, Junior this was a stupid idea!"

"It's the best we could do. Who knows how many men were about to come through that door and shoot at us all?"

Sophia made small noise and Dom kicked himself for reminding her what was likely to happen to the man they'd left behind.

"I mean, probably not. But least we're safe down here now and…"

" _Safe_ , indeed. The way I see it, we're stuck in some dusty basement and nobody has a clue we're even here!" Artemis grouched, hidden behind the rails of disused costumes.

"That's the best way," Dom said. "No-one can find us if they don't know where to look."

"And The Major? How will he find us?"

"He… he just will," Dom said, certainly.

"Oh _grow_ up, Junior," Artemis hissed. "We're lucky not all to be dead with that silly trick of yours with the spray gun, why on earth didn't you just let Bates shoot the man?"

 _Because then the next guy would have killed Bates and then us anyway_ , Dom thought, but he said nothing.

"And then we could be back upstairs where The Major left us and…"

There was one, singular gunshot from above.

The children fell silent suddenly, waiting for a second. When there wasn't one, Sophia let out a stifled sob.

One shot meant one man killed. And there had been _two_ trying to enter their original bolt hole. One shot meant that…

There was a shout from somewhere nearby and Artemis stayed silent, pressing back against the wall. Sophia grabbed his hand, her lip trembling. Dom's hands gripped nothing but his acquired handgun. The safety was still on, for now. There was movement from the stairwell and the door opened suddenly, light spilling into the dark room. He thumbed the safety off.

"Stop wasting your time pissing about down there – that was shot. Get upstairs – we need to see what it was!"

"Maybe Gary finally shot Forbes."

"Shut up – Forbes is the reason we only have one Butler to worry about."

"Also the reason the targets got away. Let's go find out what it was, anyway. This job goes anymore to shit we may as well top ourselves before the boss gets to us."

Boots thudded away up the stairs, the light dimming with the swinging shut of the door and Dom stood up quietly, replacing the safety on the gun.

"Where are you going now?" Artemis asked.

"Well… if they've already checked the room just above us, we'd be safer moving to there."

"Safer? You just said _this_ was safe!"

"Are you sure?" Sophia interrupted, wiping her eyes.

Dom bit his lip. "I think it's our best bet. And to move now; while they've only just gone.

Artemis huffed. "Fine."

Truth be told, he was embarrassed. The much younger bodyguard-boy was handling the situation whereas in all reality it should be him, as the eldest, who was taking charge. Reluctantly he followed him to the door and as a trio they began to make their way very carefully up the stairs.

* * *

 **North Stairwell, The Gaiety Theatre, Dublin**

The Major returned to the stairwell, recalculating. He had to make it to the basement, that much was certain. But how many hostiles he would meet along the way was less so. He had four guns and a couple of spare magazines, which should be more than enough for a man like _him_ to take down a small army. But he was on his own. For the first time in his life; with sole responsibility for the safety of the Fowls. No father. No brother. Just him and the charges. Not to mention Dom…

He leapt one half-flight of stairs and then the other, pausing for a moment when he heard a door close below.

"Forbes? Is that you?"

The Major froze, concentrating on the footfalls coming up the stairs towards him. Two men. Presuming they were two trained men, his lack of response would just have put them on edge.

 _Distraction._

 _Use your surroundings._

The words of his father echoed through his mind as his eyes fell on a fire-extinguisher hooked to the wall.

 _That'll do._

* * *

"Back down! Back down!" Dom ordered frantically. "Quickly!"

A great whooshing noise followed by shouting, crashing and three gunshots chased them back into the basement, white powder falling through the service stairwell like snow.

It was almost too late to move and they barely made it through the door when two bodies immediately followed them in a tangle of limbs. The larger gained the upper hand, delivering a solid, gun-reinforced punch to the smaller man's skull, rendering him unconscious and with a massive concussion at best. He had set the fire extinguisher off and thrown it down onto the two men below, following it instantly to secure their disablement. That had gone just fine until the shooting had started and in the chaos of the whirling foam he had misjudged the dimensions of the landing and stepped back over the stairs, thankfully grabbing hold of one his enemies as he went, to break his fall.

His sharp eyes whipped to the children next and for a moment they were subject to a look he would never bestow on them on purpose. His face broke out of its taciturn mask when he recognised them instantly, but only slightly. This was no time for festivity, no matter how pleased he was to see them.

"Hello boys," he said, inclining his head to them. "Miss Simmons. I hoped I'd find you down here. If you'll excuse me for a moment."

And then he was gone, back through the door after the second man he had could across in the stairwell. There were two gunshots and the children stood frozen in the darkness for agonising seconds.

Dom closed his eyes, hoping that his uncle had remained indestructible. All the same, he raised the gun and held it aimed at the doorway.

"He'll have got them, Junior. Don't worry," Artemis said, touching his arm gently.

Dom nodded. "Just in case, right?"

"Right," the Fowl – who was more like a brother than a future employer – nodded with him and squeezed his bony fingers over the younger boy's freakishly muscular shoulder.

Seconds later, a large hand pushed open the door once more and they all breathed a little easier. It was remarkable really, Artemis thought, how the presence of just one other human being could put them at such ease without a single other change to their situation.

"OK, come with me," The Major said, as calmly as though he had just returned from running an errand. "There's a fire exit on the next floor – we're taking that to the Bentley."

"What about Bates?" Sophia asked as they ran up the stairs to keep up with him. "Is he… we heard a gunshot, is he…?"

She couldn't finish the sentence, but The Major knew anyway.

"Bates is fine. I fired the shot at someone else. There's a man helping your bodyguard as we speak," The Major assured her. Which wasn't _technically_ a lie, although he neglected to mention the 'helper' was under threat of death to do so. The girl seemed somewhat assured and he ushered the three around the corner, shielding them from the sight of his latest unfortunate adversary with his own body. "Just down here at the end. That's our exit."

They raced past abandoned dressing rooms and, after The Major had pronounced it safe, out through the fire door and into the night. The cold air was sharp against their faces and Artemis pulled his suit jacket around himself.

"Do you think Mother and Father are safe?" he asked his bodyguard.

"They've cleared the area," The Major said, committing neither way. "That's a good sign, at least."

"You think?" Artemis asked, as his bodyguard made a quick check of their vehicle.

"Absolutely. Now come on, into the car."

The three children piled onto the back seat and Dom thought about how much he appreciated the feeling of safety the solid 'thunk' of the Bentley's bullet-proof doors closing behind him gave him.

His uncle climbing into the front seat only increased the feeling.

They were safe.

They were going home.

It had been quite possibly the worst and most dangerous night of his short life thus far, but they were out.

The Major pulled the big car out of the carpark, pausing only at an ambulance. He wound down the window and beckoned a paramedic.

"Do you need treatment, sir?" the man asked.

"No – but there's a man. Second floor – north side, in the caretaker's room. He's been shot. There's another with him. And some bodies."

"There's been fatalities?"

"Yes."

To his credit, the paramedic didn't look too perturbed at the news.

"OK, thank-you. Are – forgive me for asking again, but are you sure you don't need treatment, sir? You're bleeding."

The Major looked down at his shirt.

"Yes," he said, winding up the window. "But I'll live."

In the back of the car, Dom heard him, climbing forward to lean over the front seat.

"Badly?" he asked, concerned.

The Major grimaced. He had been rather hoping to keep that little fact up his sleeve, so to speak. At some point in the earlier melée, a single bullet had met some degree of its mark. It had grazed his inner arm, causing rather a lot of unnecessarily-dramatic bleeding, but was really more of an irk than an injury.

"Not badly, boy. Don't you worry about me," he assured him. "Now go strap yourself in the back. I don't trust these bastards to leave us alone just because we got out of the building."

His nephew still looked worried, but obediently returned to the rear of the vehicle.

They pulled smoothly out of the city and into the maze of rural Irish roads and for a few, long moments it seemed as though for once the old 'Butler paranoia' had been wrong.

Unfortunately, 'wrong' was not something a Butler made a habit of being.

They had made it barely more than a few miles, before the Blue Diamond swore under his breath, dipping the rear-view mirror down to shield his vision.

Headlights flared in his wingmirrors and he quickly began to calculate a new route to a suitable safehouse.

"Problems, Major?" Artemis asked.

"You have your seatbelts on?"

Artemis checked.

"Yes," he said, uncertainly.

"Then," The Major said, easing his boot down on the accelerator. "No problems."

* * *

 **That last little bit was actually the first part of this story that I got written down. It was my 'sit!flash' for this, as I call them haha**

 **Let me know if I'm updating too fast and I'll string it out a bit for you guys to keep up.**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**

 **03/12/18**


	5. Chapter 4 - Collision Course

**Thanks to: _Shadow914, shiningpearls, Guest, 6000j, Alchemechanist, Spencerblue, Fowl Fox, Steinbock_ and _kunoichi_ \- seriously guys, I can't thank you enough, you're amazing. Thank-you for making me check my emails a dozen times a day and grin like a loon. You know I'll reply individually if I can, but for all of you: it's so nice to see old buddies pop up in the reviews again and again. Hope you're all doing well.**

 **WARNINGS: badassery, carchassery, tenacity... all of the asseries.**

 **I hope this lives up to expectations!**

* * *

 **CHAPTER FOUR**

 **'COLLISION COURSE'**

 _ **Definition: On an approach likely to lead to**_ ** _conflict_**

 **Rural Lanes, Outskirts of Dublin**

The car roared and the safety strap cut into Dom's neck, but he didn't scream. He knew that might distract his uncle from some vital aspect of the dark and winding road they were careering down at speeds approaching triple figures. So, unlike Artemis and Sophia, Dom kept his mouth shut and his teeth gritted against the slinging movement of the tail end of the Bentley.

The pursuing cars were relentless. With their high beams blindingly bright through the back window, they dogged the Fowl bodyguard's every move. He knew the roads, but not as well as those close to Fowl Manor – which he was _not_ about to draw their hunters anywhere close to. Being midwinter and a less-frequented lane, patches of ice and hard frost had him feeling the Bentley's wheels judder and skid, spitting up week-old salt and tiny stones from the last gritter to have passed this way, tinkling against the undercarriage as he fought to keep them on course.

The Major dipped his rearview mirror to stop the headlights dazzling him, throwing his view of the children into dim shadow - not that that was too much of a bad thing. He was under enough pressure as it was without their pale faces staring back at him in his peripheral vision as a constant reminder of what was at stake.

He glanced over at the car in his wingmirror, which was attempting to force its way between the Bentley and the tall hedgerow that lined the lane, with near-suicidal determination.

 _Objects in this mirror may be closer than they appear,_ Myles thought grimly, as he gave an inch or so to avoid a collision.

That was all the vehicle needed, ramming itself alongside and suddenly becoming _on_ the mirror, rather than in it.

"Keep your heads down!" he barked, as he caught a glimpse of a something that reflected the moonlight, sticking from the passenger window of the other car.

Something pinged off the Bentley's metalwork, a second noise like the smack of a heavy glass jar hitting the tiles, spider-webbing the window. Myles grabbed the lever at the side of his seat and leaned back so that he was covered by the door pillar.

"Junior - gun, please," he said, as calmly as possible given the circumstances. "Quick as you like."

Drawing his own weapon would have required taking his hand from the wheel for much longer than it took Dom to unclip his belt and pass him the one he had been carrying since the theatre box shootout.

"Safety off!" Dom said quickly, as he handed it over.

"Good lad. Hold on."

Dom braced himself against the back of the chairs, trying to remember if he was supposed to grit his teeth or slacken his jaw in the event of an impact. As it was, he needn't work it out, for at that moment, The Major did several things so consecutively, they seemed almost simultaneous. The first was to drop an elbow onto the 'fancy' (as his father had branded them) button which would electrically open the driver's side window. The second was to break sharply. The third was to fire three shots into the other car as it shot past them as intended and, just as the centre of the vehicle drew level with the nose of the Bentley, he accelerated again, drawing on much of the large engine's considerable power to ram the front wing.

The tyres bit into the rough tarmac, propelling the car into its opponent.

 _Sorry baby,_ The Major winced, as the front headlight blew with a crunch.

The other driver over-compensated - a death-sentence for their pursuit intentions on the icy roads - and veered off, mud slinging from its wheels before was stopped very suddenly indeed by a thick, tall shape in the darkness. They passed by far too quickly to see how badly it was damaged, but it most certainly brought their pursuing vehicle count down by one.

"Back in your seat, Junior," he warned, as they hurtled on into the night.

Dom wisely obeyed, clipping his belt just in time as the car sped up behind them.

"Hold tight. This might get rough," The Major warned, dropping a gear to make the oncoming corner and anticipating the jolt as their enemy hit the bumper, threatening to spin them out of control.

But Myles Butler hadn't attended Madam Ko's Academy and not learnt every trick in the book when it came to driving. Just like when his brother had tried to T-bone him on the final lap of one of their very many scrap-car races designed to practice their defensive, evasive and offensive driving - and referred to fondly by the students as 'Collision Courses' - he turned into the skid and accelerated, only forced to brake for the near-hairpin bend. The other driver had clearly not attended the same classes as he and their car went off at a tangent, smashing straight through a five-bar gate into the field beyond.

Which would have just fine, had there not been a van parked perpendicular across the icy road ahead.

"Brace!" he had time to bark, slamming his foot down on the brake and aiming for the rear of the vehicle, which should in theory lighten the impact than hitting the engine blocks together full on.

Though that wasn't to say there was no real impact at all.

The back of the van appear to implode, the panels crumpling as the Bentley plowed on. But even the great beast of a machine that it was couldn't stand up entirely to a collision of that magnitude. Something gave - a track rod, the steering arm, maybe - and the steering column lost all efficiency. Myles had time to think that his beloved vehicle would most definitely need its tyres realigning after that, before they slid uncontrollably sideways into the dark.

Unfortunately for them, it wasn't _just_ the dark.

More by luck than judgement, although when he replayed it in his head The Major would be quietly confident it would have been worse had it not been him driving, it was the front and mid-section of the car which took the brunt of the damage. Had it been the rear, the results could have been much more catastrophic. The airbags deployed with a bang and as it was, the worst the passengers in the back would receive was friction burns from their seatbelts and a mild case of whiplash. Even the driver was mostly protected by his faithful vehicle, as it ploughed broadside into a large sycamore just beyond the apex of the bend in the road. Which was fortunate, for he was about to be even more needed than he already was.

"Everyone alright?" he shouted, almost as soon as the sound of the crash had stopped ringing in their ears. He pushed his hand into his jacket for his gun, ripping his seatbelt off and spinning around to do a visual assessment of the damage.

The children groaned in confirmation, two rubbing their necks, the third copying his uncle and undoing his belt to slide forward in his seat. But before they could do anything else, there came a sharp noise like gravel being flicked against the side of the Bentley. Only these missiles were definitely _not_ made of stone.

"Get down!" The Major ordered, gesturing them – his gun already in-hand.

Artemis and Sophia unclipped their seatbelts frantically and crammed themselves into the footwells alongside the bodyguard's nephew. More bullets ricocheted into the Bentley's paintwork, but the bullet-proofing held. For now. The Major gritted his teeth. They were sitting ducks. There was only one way out of this…

The passenger-side door had crumpled considerably on impact, leaving a possible gap in their defences, but as the car had hit the tree a lot more glancingly than it would had it been piloted by an average driver, it had thus slid forwards, rather than remained pinned against the wood and it was feasible it would open with some force. The Major was going to make it his mission that it only opened from the inside. And only once.

"Right," he said, exhaling heavily, as one may when they are about to give a particular kind of unavoidably bad news. "I'm going to ask you to do something now and you must do it no matter what goes on on the other side of these doors, understood?"

"Major, I…" the Fowl boy started.

"No talking now, Artemis. Just answer me. Have I got your attention?" he said, crawling halfway through the gap and leaning over the top of them.

"Y… yes," Artemis faltered, flinching as more bullets hit the side of the car.

They could hear voices now. Getting louder. It would be a matter of moments before it would be too late to operate his plan and The Major didn't plan to waste a single second of them.

He opened the drinks cabinet and for a moment Artemis almost laughed at the bizarre notion that his bodyguard was planning on taking a quick snifter before saving the day as he always did. He did _not_ expect the man to jam his hand upwards and puncture a hole in the ceiling of the small cupboard. Nor did he expect there to be a gun concealed in there, which The Major ripped out and tucked into the empty holster under his jacket. Seven guns, now. His two, his father's, Bates', Gary's confiscated gun and the one he had taken from the dead guy, the concealed one from the Bentley… Plus two magazines for reloading. He took a glance through the window. It was possible even that wouldn't be enough.

"Good. I need you to stay put. To stay low. If you lift the bench seat there, there's a blast-proof compartment. It's designed for one adult, so at least two of you should fit at a squeeze."

"But Major there's three of…"

"I am aware of that, sir," the Butler said curtly, turning to his nephew. "Junior – you remember where all the pieces are?"

Dom nodded. His eyes were like black holes in his pale face, but his voice didn't waver as he rattled an affirmative.

"Good lad," The Major nodded back at him. He didn't need to ask if he remembered how to put them together, or tell him to do so. "You know what to do."

"Pieces? What pieces? Major?" Artemis said – the reality of what his bodyguard was about to do; about to _sacrifice_ , becoming all too clear to him in that moment. "Surely we should all just wait here until help…"

"Not an option, Artemis," the Blue Diamond said, though not unkindly. "My father is dead and we can only hope that yours is in a better state. Help…"

 _Help may not be coming,_ is what he thought to say, but he altered it for his present company, glancing at the Bentley's dashboard where a red light blinked, signalling the heralding of assistance from the manor.

"… help will be on the way," he said instead; the white lie the least of his worries right now.

Two of the children believed him at least. The other boy knew that although the Bentley's emergency beacon would have begun transmitting after the crash, whether there would be anybody able and assist them from the receiving end was only a slight possibility. They would come, for sure. But in time? That was a different matter.

"So for now stay down and whatever happens – _whatever happens_ ," The Major reiterated. "Whatever you hear, whatever you see, whatever you _think_ – you do not get out of this car until I come back. Do you understand?"

All three nodded.

"And if I don't," he paused only to look pointedly at his nephew. "If I don't come back, you boys know what to do. Look after eachother and Miss Sophia and stay safe until someone can get you out of here."

Artemis and Dom, looked at each other. They had both been given very thorough kidnapping training indeed. Artemis began to wish he'd taken it rather more seriously than he had. Sophia began to wish she had been given any such training at all. Dom was fervently wishing he wouldn't have to use what he had learnt.

"Those are my instructions. Now give me your word that you will follow them," The Major said, seeing the Fowl boy's brain beginning to whirr behind his eyes.

"Major…"

"Your _word_ , Artemis," he said firmly.

"I…" he paused, but another bullet hit the glass and this time a single speckle of a shard fell silently onto the leather seat above them.

"There isn't time for arguing. I cannot protect you if you do not follow my instructions to the letter and if I am thinking about whether or not you _are_ safe, I cannot be thinking about doing the things I need to _do_ to _keep_ you safe," Myles told him – a long explanation in the circumstances and not entirely true, but if he at least could pretend he believed the Fowl boy would do as he asked, he could dedicate less brain-space to wondering if he had. "Do I have your word?"

"Alright," Artemis said, reluctantly. "Alright, Major, you have it."

"Thank-you," he said, relieved although he still didn't quite believe it. It was no small thing to trust a Fowl. "Now sit tight and all being well I'll be back with you momentarily."

Sophia was reminded of the stories of menfolk going to war and writing letters back to their families. Letters of hope and promises of return… She tried not to think of how many of those never did, for although he said it almost jovially, the fact he reached through the seats and squeezed his young nephew's shoulder – just for a moment –before he prised open the passenger door and slid out into the night, spoke more of what the man expected than words ever would.

* * *

He shut the door behind him. With any luck the mechanism would jam even more the second time, trapping his charges inside, sure, but inside was better than outside in this situation. Even if the bullets penetrated the Bentley's outer shell, the fuel tank was reinforced against everything up to and including a grenade and if their latest enemies happened to have a rocket launcher with them, then it was all over anyway.

 _It's not over until the fat lady sings,_ Myles thought, unable to believe that a mere forty five minutes or so ago he was stood next to his father in a cushy box at the opera theatre, hearing him mutter those very words, quipping back a snarky response, his father giving a dry snort in place of laughter. His father. _Pa…_

He refused to think any more about it. In fact, further contemplation may aid his swift following of his father's untimely demise and that would only serve to severely anger the man's spirit, for sure. If there was an afterlife, he wasn't certain a clip around the ear would hurt just as much non-corporeally, but he equally wasn't keen to find out.

 _OK then, let's see what you've got,_ he thought to himself, crawling behind the wheel of the big car, putting two alloys and an engine block between himself and enemy fire. He made a swift reccy of the situation, bobbing up above the bonnet and firing two shots at the closest attackers. One found its mark particularly well and the body dropped to the floor. The Major would have felt some pity for the man going down so easily, had he not been part of a team attacking everything he was born to protect.

His retaliation stopped the frequency of the bullets, but redirected those that still came.

 _Good,_ he thought. The more bullets coming this way, the less hitting the already at-breaking-point window to the rear of the car.

He fired shot after shot, but they had the advantage of numbers and double-handedly he was getting through his ammo faster than they were. Two of the guns – the ones he had confiscated from his enemies – hadn't had as many bullets in as he hoped. Bates had done him well and his father's of course, but reloading wasn't going to be much of a possibility.

"Junior – I'm going to need that other gun!" he bellowed, hoping his nephew would hear him.

* * *

Inside the car, Domovoi did indeed hear. And he had already been busy collecting the parts of the gun.

"What are you doing?" Artemis hissed, dragging at his arm – Dom shrugged him off.

"Getting a gun together. My uncle needs it."

"Well I'm sure he's going to have time to piece all _that_ together," Artemis snapped sarcastically. "Get down, Junior! For goodness sake!"

"He won't need to," Dom said, laying out the pieces on the seat cover. There was something missing.

"And I suppose you're going to put it together for him?"

"Yep," said Dom, realising the piece – and also where it was hidden – he had already pulled the seat forward to get to the one in the boot. "I've been putting guns together for ages now."

Not exactly true, but a white lie. He knew what he was doing. Mostly.

"Now please can you pass me the slide – it's under the floormat you're sat on."

 _'Slide'_ , in normal seven-year-old jargon would never mean anything more than a piece of playground equipment, but Artemis shuffled and moved himself around until he could peel back the mat and – sure enough – there was a metal oblong concealed in a recessed pit underneath.

"I've got it!" said Sophia, retrieving it for him and passing it to Artemis.

"Honestly, Junior – remind me to stop making fun of your family's paranoia…" he muttered, as he handed over the missing piece.

Dom added it to his display. He picked up one piece, hesitantly... Then he put it down and picked up another. This was easy. It was _easy_. Why couldn't he do it properly?

"I thought you said you could build it," Sophia said, shuffling over for a look herself.

"I can," Dom growled. "I just…"

"It's the environment," Artemis informed him. "You're having a mental block because of the stress. Just try to concentrate…"

"I _am_ trying!" the boy snapped, ghosting his hands over the top of the pieces to check they were laid out how he wanted them.

"Junior – gun, ASAP!"

The Major was suddenly at the passenger window once more.

"I… I can't build it. I just…" he shouted back, feeling his throat tighten.

But his uncle didn't chide him.

"Yes, you can," he said, his voice never wavering as he took three more shots over the roof of the Bentley, then crouched down to cover.

Dom looked at him through the glass and shook his head.

"My head's all fuzzy… I can't…" the boy almost whimpered.

"Yes you _can_ ," The Major repeated. "Now listen to me. Close your eyes."

"Close his eyes? I fail to see how…" Artemis began, but he petered off as Sophia shushed him urgently and the Butler boy did as he was told.

"Closed them?"

"Yeah," Dom said, hesitantly.

"Good. Now take a deep breath and ignore everything," The Major shouted, taking another potshot over the roof. The enemy were getting closer. They knew he was running out of bullets. Out of time. Guns lay scattered, abandoned in the leaf-litter - about as much use as water balloons if he was to lob them. "You're at home. You're in the gun room. I'm right opposite you. Pa… Pa's right next to you."

Artemis noticed the hesitation and the name he had only overheard them use a handful of times in front of him and suddenly remembered the noise of Butler hitting the floor. Of what it meant. Not only to him and his family – particularly his father, who had spent barely a day out of the man's company, his _protection_ , in his life, but of what it meant to his own bodyguard and the young boy next to him.

"You can do it, Junior," he whispered to his lifelong friend. "I know it."

"I've got the stopwatch. You're going to try to beat your record. Are you ready?" The Major called from outside, and if he was concerned about his current lack of gunpower, he didn't show it. Though he didn't wait for confirmation from his nephew, either. "OK, three, two, one – go!"

Dom took a breath and, keeping his eyes closed, did exactly as he was told.

And suddenly he _could_ do it.

His hands flashed across the seat, snagging pieces here and there as they went, sliding them together with clunks and clicks… the only difference he felt was that the magazine was heavy with live rounds. With a series of sliding clicks and clunks, he had the weapon assembled.

"Done!" he yapped out of habit, his brain almost filling in the beep of the stopwatch timer being pressed to record his record attempt. "Uncle – I did it!"

But there was no reply from outside the car.

* * *

Myles had the very rough workings of a plan. Unfortunately, the others involved in it weren't co-operating; as people tended not to, when their deaths were a part of his scheming.

"Shite," he muttered under his breath, realising that – as quick as Dom was – his enemy had taken advantage of his lack of firing response to come closer, perhaps thinking he was out of ammo. Or dead.

Rather too shortly than he would like, he could be either.

He had so far taken out any stupid enough to try to get close to the car, as well as both drivers of the enemy vehicles and one who had tried to come around the side of the van and the other who had been mud-coated enough for him to guess had come through the vehicle that had gone through the gate. Presuming they were operating a dozen-man team, he had killed at least four out here, plus the three in he'd taken care of back at the theatre and the man he had left with Bates... Plus the one Bates himself had shot down, which brought the total kill count to nine. According to his 'dozen man team' information, that could be just three more men between him and the secured safety of the charges...

He popped up once more, taking two more shots and a mental picture for a headcount.

His heart sank. Apparently the collision with the tree hadn't been as fatal has he had hoped.

He counted almost half a dozen guns pointed in his direction. And they were close now. Far too close. If he rushed them, he'd be cut down instantly. If he tried to shoot them from behind the car, they would duck down out of the way until he was out of bullets. If he made a run around the perimeter to ambush them, not only would take too long, it would also mean firing directly at the car itself and risk hitting the charges with friendly fire.

It left him with one viable option.

And it wasn't much of an option at that.

He clicked his last two magazines into his guns.

It was stupid.

It was unlikely to work.

It was kamikaze.

But he wasn't in a position to be fussy.

Pulling his last hope from a concealed pocket in his jacket, he pulled the pin out with his teeth and waited just long enough for the fuse to run down. Then he leaned around the back end of the stricken Bentley and rolled the rounded shape into the middle of the men approaching the vehicle. Only one saw it, barely having time to give warning before it blew.

But it wasn't an explosive grenade – he wouldn't risk that so close to the vehicle with his charges inside. Instead it was one that emitted a cloud of thick, grey smoke, completely obliterating everything inside a ten-metre radius.

And into the confusion, though he could see nothing himself either, strode Myles 'The Major' Butler, gun in either hand and teeth bared in a grimace.

 _Six against one. Practically even-stevens._

* * *

There was an explosion. There was screaming. Yells. Bullets firing.

And then, at long last…

"Do you think…?" Artemis began, very quietly, once the silence had reigned on too long for him to bear it anymore.

There was a heavy thud as something landed forcibly against the side of the Bentley, followed by a dragging _slide_ of a noise.

Sophia let out a scream and the three of them shied away from the window.

Whatever was outside had slid down the side of the car and collapsed heavily to the floor.

Silence again.

This time, it was Dom who broke first.

"Stay put," he said, creeping back to the front of the car. "I'm going to see what's happening"

"Major said _stay_ , Junior! You gave your word!" Artemis said, as sternly as he could muster.

"No, Tim," said Dom, listening very carefully to the woodland on the other side of the door before attempting to open it. " _You_ gave _your_ word. I didn't give anything. If I don't come back, please get under the seat and stay there until it's safe."

And with that he cracked open the door.

"Junior - who do you think you are? You are not your uncle! You are seven years old for Christ's sake - get back here!"

An owl hooted somewhere in the silence of the darkness.

"Junior!" Artemis hissed again. "I am _ordering_ you to stay in this vehicle!"

"Tell me again in ten years," Dom quipped, and got out of the car.

* * *

 **So... didja like it? Didja? Didja?**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**

 **06/12/18**


	6. Chapter 5 - Heir

**Thanks to: spencerblue, Steinbock, 6000j for reviewing. I've had to do too much 'peopling' this weekend and having reviews to read was a nice distraction.**

 **WARNINGS: threat of violence, actual violence, weaponry, injuries, swearing... is there really any need to prewarn you at this point? What have you been reading if you got this far without noticing?**

* * *

 **CHAPTER 5**

 **'HEIR'**

 _ **Definition: a person who inherits and carries on the work of a predecessor**_

 **Rural Lanes, Outskirts of Dublin**

Dom shut the door behind him. It was a sharper kind of quiet outside the muffled protection of the Bentley. Inside the car, everything out here had sounded almost as though it was underwater. Now his ears strained so hard he could hear the whistle of silence ringing through his head. He stepped quietly around the guns strewn in the small area his uncle had been shooting from and took up the very same crouched position he had by the wheel.

He couldn't see anything from here – certainly not where his uncle had got to, at any rate.

He would just have to trust that the threat had been neutralised.

He took a deep breath, holstered the handgun in the belt of his suit trousers at stood; hopeful that from here he would be able to see his uncle checking the area was secure and on his way back to reassure them that everything was fine. Or at least as fine as it could be tonight.

Unfortunately for him, his hopes were about to be dashed.

As he rounded the edge of the Bentley, a cry went up like a hound that had seen a fox and before he could so much as make more than a few-strided sprint for the woods, a man had grabbed him. Going against all training, he began to holler and scream as loudly as he could, in the desperate hope that Artemis would hear him and take the appropriate action of _getting the hell under the rear seats of the Bentley and laying as still as he could until it was safe._

"Get off me!" he shouted, struggling as the man held him by the upper arm. The man was only holding him with one hand, the other was clamped across his chest and Dom could see he was bleeding from the shoulder.

 _Good_.

"What's your name, kid?" he demanded.

Dom clamped his mouth tightly shut.

"I said, _what is your name?_ " the man spat, shaking him roughly and dragging him towards the middle of the road.

Dom felt the gun slip slightly in his waistband and forced himself not to reach for it.

Suddenly he knew what to say.

Safely cowering under the rear seat of the Bentley – for they were not quite as stupid as their bodyguards often feared – Sophia's grip on his hand tightened suddenly as the Fowl boy heard, not for the first and certainly not for the _last_ time, the young Butler put himself in direct line of fire for the family his family served.

"OK, ouch! Stop it! I'm Artemis!" said Domovoi, channelling his inner Bartelby's Brat. "My… my name is Artemis."

"Fowl?" the man said, seemingly genuinely surprised.

Dom nodded, keeping his gaze as far away from the back of the Bentley as possible. If the group attacking them had not done their research properly, they would not notice the differences. He looked older than he actually was. He knew the Fowl family inside out if they questioned him. And, most importantly, he was apparently the only other person in the car. Which fitted just right with the man that was sat up against the Bentley, leaning on it as though it was the only thing holding him in any semblance of upright; the bodyguard of Artemis Fowl.

"Perfect," the crook who had hold of him said and his face broke into a nasty smile and he shouted to his leader; "Hey boss, you're gonna like this!"

"I doubt it," drawled the older man. "What are you expecting a raise for now?"

"I got the Fowl kid!"

On the floor The Major groaned internally. He did _everything_ he could to keep the boy safe and _still_ …

But even he found it hard not to react when _the_ _wrong boy_ rounded the edge of the stricken car and was slung forward in front of the boss. Dom tripped and fell heavily, looking up at the man, wide-eyed.

"Fuck," his uncle muttered under his breath. Shoulder-Shot stepped over the boy and kicked him in the ribs. The Major made no attempt to block him. It would only antagonise the man to punish him further and besides, he wasn't even certain the extra few units of pain even registered when the boot made contact.

"Some bodyguard you are, Diamond," he sneered.

Myles said nothing, calculating. If Dom was out here, that meant Artemis was safe – for the time being. The pair of them, however…

"Check the car," the man in charge said to another who appeared to have been uninjured by the shootout.

Dom clenched his fists, praying silently to whatever bodyguard gods there were that Artemis had worked out how to open the hatch.

There was a few long seconds, then the door slammed.

"Nowt, boss."

"And the boot."

"The boot, boss?"

"Yes - the boot. Jesus Christ - how have I ended up with you two?"

He didn't actually verbalise that he would have happily traded both these men for the ones lying face down on the road, but it was true.

"Sorry, boss."

"Right. Get the other Forbes on the radio," the boss told Shoulder-Shot whilst his other remaining teammate tried to work out how to open the Bentley's secure boot. "Tell him and that chump Gary to hurry the fuck up. The garda will be over this place as soon as they get their shit together."

"You'll be waiting a while," The Major rasped, determined to be a thorn in their side until his very last breath. "If you mean the amateurs I took out in the theatre."

"What?" Shoulder-Shot snorted. "What's this chump chatting? You got lead in your head, Diamond geezer? Or you just want some?""

The Major held up four bloodied fingers, a crimson grin on his face.

"Four down by me," he breathed raggedly, holding up a thumb next. "One by a friend."

Shoulder-Shot sneered again. "Keep dreaming."

But he reached for a radio all the same.

"Yo, Forbes - check in."

"Here - what you talking about?"

"Not you, you prat," Shoulder Shot scoffed.

The radio fizzled.

"Forbes, quit pissing about. Answer - pronto. Boss wants ya."

The 'Boss' himself raised an eyebrow.

"Out of signal," Shoulder-Shot provided as explanation, but he eyed The Major as he said it.

Or maybe, maybe this man was telling the truth and he had indeed dispatched two thirds of their team already.

There was a silence which made it clear this eventuality had not been factored into their plans.

The other man bounced the car in frustration and The Major thought the henchman's idiocy was killing him faster than the bloodloss.

"Press the fucking lock in and lift it from the groove above the reg, for fuck's sake," he growled.

"What?"

"It's a security lock," The Major grimaced as he sat up. "Two buttons."

"It's a security lock, two buttons," the man mimicked. "Fuck off, I can open a boot."

"Clearly," The Major spat.

"What kind of backwards fucking lock..."

"Your brother was no better at following instructions either," The Major took a punt at something he had deduced from what had been said.

"What?" - this time there was a layer of menace to the word. "What did you just say?"

"I said you can see the family resemblance," The Major panted. "'Cept you're still spouting stupid."

The man strode from the back of the Bentley and a hefty boot bounced off The Major again – but he was beyond feeling much more pain now. He chuckled, coughing as the man kicked him viciously, once, twice…

 _Give me a third belt and I'll rip that leg of yours off and beat you around the head with the soggy end…_

Wishful thinking.

"Enough! We move on," said the boss, irritably. "If he's lying, the others can catch us up."

"What about the boy?" Shoulder-Shot said, gesturing at Dom who flinched automatically away from the muzzle of his gun as he waved it at him. "Ransom?"

"To who? Fowl is _supposed_ to be dead," the other man spat, angrily. He did indeed happen to be the brother of the man The Major had killed back in the corridor outside the caretaker's office, though was thus-far doing better than his sibling in avoiding the bodyguard's bullets. "That was the deal!"

Myles, as much as he would like to know the reasoning behind this attack, was not keen on learning their plan. The more they said around him, the less they were intending on keeping him alive. Not that things were looking promising on that front, intentions or not.

"But thanks to your idiotic brother, he isn't, is he?" the boss said, rounding on him.

"My brother… If my brother is dead I want Fowl's head on a plate myself!" he snarled.

"Oh don't be so dramatic, Forbes!"

Dom got slowly to his knees.

"Stay down… sir," The Major said, lowly. "Just do as they say."

Dom nodded, unable to communicate that he had no plans of doing such a thing. The gun was heavy on his back; he just had to find a way to get it to him.

"I say we kill them both and get after the big game. These two are nothing. Fowl is the target and where is he whilst we're standing around getting shot at by this Butler offcut?" Shoulder-Shot said, clamping his hand down harder over his bullet wound bitterly and jerking his head at the crippled bodyguard.

"We kill the Diamond, the boy comes with us for bargaining," the boss said, turning and pointing his gun lazily at The Major. Why would he be anything else? He still had two men – albeit one injured – as well as himself and the remaining Fowl bodyguard was lying half-dead on the floor. What could he do?

Nothing, apparently, but that wasn't to say the boy wouldn't…

"No!" snapped the other Forbes suddenly, aiming his own gun much more vehemently. "I want to do it if he killed my brother!"

"Fine," the boss sighed, holstering his weapon. "But make it quick. Every moment you piss about a _venging your brother's honour_ or whatever it is you're intending, Fowl is another step out of reach. And make the boy watch – I want him to know what the situation is."

He turned away, disinterested in the deaths of side-targets.

Shoulder-Shot grabbed Dom, pulling him from the floor, and held him by the collar of the jacket, forcing him to look at his uncle.

"This is what will happen to _you_ if you don't behave – understood?" he hissed into his ear, breath rasping on his cheek.

Dom said nothing, his heart racing, unable to believe what was happening.

It was going to be miraculous. His uncle was about to leap to his feet and disarm the man – shoot him dead with his own gun and take out Shoulder-Shot in the same movement.

But the seconds ticked on and The Major made not even an effort to move.

He was biding his time, surely? Milking the element of surprise.

 _Get up. Get up, Uncle. Please get up._

"You – piece of shit!" the younger Forbes brother snarled at the prone bodyguard. "On your knees."

Myles bared his teeth and breathed bloody defiance; "I don't do so well with instructions either."

More to the point, he wasn't sure if he actually _could_ pull himself to his knees and he didn't want an embarrassing belly-flop to the ground to be his final action on this Earth.

"You want to die lying in the dirt? _Look at me_ before I send you straight after your bastard father!"

Myles looked at Dom instead. The boy was on the verge of breaking.

"It's OK," he said calmly, his gaze steady despite his laboured breathing. "Don't watch. Close your eyes. It's going to be OK."

"Stop talking to him!" the brother henchman shouted. "And you – look at the one that was supposed to keep you safe and see how he's failed you!"

"I told you," Myles said, pushing himself upwards slightly on one arm. "I don't take orders from you. And neither does he."

"Fuck you then," spat the man, taking loose aim before he made the shot.

"No!" Dom yelled, spinning and hammering his fist smack in the bullet wound of his captor as hard as he could.

The man all-but shrieked and the boy ripped free of the one-handed grip he was held in, leaping at the avenging brother. He caught his shooting arm with both hands and swung from it as though it was a low-hanging tree limb, pulling the shot wide as he fired the weapon more in surprise than by design. Myles ducked away from it and the bullet ricocheted off the bulletproof metal of the Bentley, burying itself instead in the leg of Shoulder-Shot guy who bellowed in agony once more.

"You fucking idiot!" he howled, dropping to the floor and clutching his latest injury.

The shooter swore in fury and clouted Dom with his free hand.

"You little _bastard_!" he spat at him.

The hit dazed the boy, making him lose his grip and his attacker kicked him solidly in the gut, winding him. Dom wasted no time in scrambling towards the perceived safety of his uncle and though the giant grabbed him as soon as he was close enough and slung him into the small space he made between his back and the car, it was all he could do to provide any measure of protection at all. Dom pressed himself close, reaching urgently for the giant's hand. At first The Major thought he was seeking comfort - like any little boy would when faced with a nightmare like this. Only if it wasn't reality, it was doing a bloody good impression. He closed his eyes momentarily. Had it only been a matter of days since he had watched the same child piggy-backing his schoolmate across a stage in a school hall, dressed as some likeness of a donkey?

"Dom," he breathed, as quietly as he could. "You'll be alright. No more heroics. Just be grey."

He was instructing him not to draw any more attention to himself. To behave as they asked and be no trouble. It was his best hope of getting out of this situation alive. He reached for his hand, willing to give him that at least now, if it was what he needed. But instead of a small, warm clutch of fingers, a cold, hard, heavy object was pressed against his palm. His grip closed around it automatically and he slipped it behind his back.

This wasn't any little boy. Oh how could he have forgotten that even for a moment? This was his nephew. The latest in a long line of ruthless guardians. He was trained. He was sharp. And he most certainly was not going to let him go down without a fight.

 _You wonderful, wonderful kid,_ he thought, as his downtrodden spirit soared suddenly once more.

The boy had handed him a lifeline. But only if life itself handed him the opportunity to use it.

"What the hell is going on?" the boss demanded, stepping back out of the only functioning vehicle his party had left - a car which had been on the other side of the smashed van. "Jesus Christ! You can't even handle a child, let alone a gun!"

He ripped the handgun off his man, pistol whipping him across the face with it angrily.

"But boss!" Forbes the younger complained, clasping at his cheek.

"Fuck _'but boss!'_ – cut him dead before I shoot you as well!" the boss snapped angrily. "And you – quit whinging and get in the car!"

Shoulder – and now _knee_ as well, it would seem – Shot, whimpered to his feet and began to drag himself to their getaway vehicle. The dead man's brother drew a long knife from his belt holster, fuming.

"When I start shooting," Myles murmured to his nephew without moving his lips. "Make for cover. Don't wait for me."

Dom responded as surreptitiously as he could, squeezing his elbow tightly for a moment.

"Can I kill the brat?"

"Goddamnit Forbes! I'll kill _you_ if you don't hurry up – and no! I told you; bring the damn kid!"

"Fine," the other Forbes said, stalking towards them, glaring at the youngest Butler, who was buried his face into his uncle's shoulder. "He never said you had to be in one piece, you little shit…"

He was going to enjoy this.

"Ready?" Myles muttered, tensing the muscles in his back as the man approached.

Dom fisted his hands into his uncle's blood-soaked shirt under his jacket and closed his eyes, acting scared was easier, but in reality he was on his knees and primed to push himself off the cold floor and into a run. He had done all he could now. It was down to The Major, as per usual, to save the day.

The man slammed the heel of his hand onto The Major's forehead, smacking his skull backwards against the Bentley's side and exposing his neck.

"I bet you'll look at me now," he said, through gritted teeth as he brought the knife tight against his captive's jugular – not his carotid; he wanted the man to suffer slowly as he bled out. "How's it feel to fail? I'm going to kill this Fowl brat as soon as I get chance, you hear me? You've _failed_. The Fowl line ends today because of _you_."

"Wrong... heir..." The Major breathed.

"What?" the man pulled back to look at him.

Dom glared up defiantly from behind his uncle. Two pairs of identical eyes and very similar faces… Something buzzed in the man's brain and suddenly he wasn't entirely sure the kid here was Fowl's son at all. Deciding to deal with that possibility as soon as he dispatched the Diamond, he readjusted his grip on his knife...

"Fowl's kid, not Fowl's kid- I couldn't give a fuck who's heir he is," he verbalised scornfully, lining up his knife once more.

"You should," Myles bared his teeth. "'Cause he's... _my.._. heir."

There was a single flicker of uncertainty in the stranger's eyes before the life went out of them.

The Major had brought his armed hand between them and shot him straight through the chest at point blank range, following it up with one to the head as the man fell, just to make sure. Dom sprinted for the back of the Bentley, slinging himself around the corner of the taillights and to the safety of the other side and slapping both hands over his ears, all by the time the body had stopped moving on the floor. Shoulder-Shot made a much clumsier run for their own car, but the warning he was shouting died in his throat with him before he could make it. Myles all but emptied the magazine at the leader of the group as he too ran for the vehicle. The man turned and shot with the gun he had taken from Forbes, throwing himself behind the open door for cover.

Myles kept firing.

Straight through the single-plane window.

Three perfect circles appeared in the glass and the boss crumpled, landing half-in, half-out of the safety of the vehicle.

 _And there is the beauty of spending an extra few quid on bulletproof,_ The Major thought to himself, energy more spent than his bullets, chest heaving like bellows as he struggled to maintain his oxygen level at all costs.

The night was still again. Quiet, but for the hissing of wounded vehicles leaking their vital engine fluids onto the ground. Much like himself, he mused humourlessly, as he gazed numbly around the scene he had created.

As satisfied as he could be that his job was done, Myles let the tension ebb out of his muscles, slumping against his faithful Bentley.

"Well, old girl," he mumbled, barely aloud, patting a bloody hand print onto the paintwork. "Least we're going out together, eh?"

* * *

 **I love the Butlers. Really I do. The whole family. Honestly.**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**


	7. Chapter 6 - Cold Comfort

**Thanks to: _FowlFox, 6000j_ and _Spencerblue_ for the reviews. As always, I will try to reply to you if you're signed in. You have no idea how much I enjoy reading what people think about my work. By the time I'm posting these things, I've usually re-read them so many times they just seem boring and shite to me and if the reviews tail off I really lose motivation to continue posting if nobody wants to read it anyway. So yeah. Thank-you for taking the time, it really is appreciated.**

 **WARNINGS: Angsty AF. Angst and gruff!fluff. Literally nothing else happens in this chapter. Must've been having a bad day when I wrote it. Sorry folks.**

* * *

 **CHAPTER 6**

 **'COLD COMFORT'**

 _ **Definition: Slight consolation in an unsalvageable situation**_

 **Rural Lanes, Outskirts of Dublin**

Dom, with his back pressed against the alloy wheel on the other side, listened. Straining his ears intently for any sound that might mean he could move.

Some ruptured pipe or other was hissing into the night air and Dom forcibly filled his head of thoughts of how his uncle would show him how to fix it when they got back to the manor together…

But he kept his wits about him this time.

Moving from cover would tell him one of two things; either that there were no more enemies left, or that there were. If there _were_ , he may even be unlucky enough to be shot on sight, after his last trick.

Taking several deep breaths to calm himself, he crept at a crouch back to the rear of the car and peeked around the edge. Nobody shot at him. In fact, it became apparently that there was nobody left _to_ shoot at him.

It was… carnage.

Quiet, but not quite _completely_ quiet. There was the hush of nature, returning after the deafening explosions of the gunfire, to claim the cold, winter night as its own once more. The very last of the smoke from the grenade The Major had thrown – seemingly hours ago now – had dissipated, curling away into the woodland and fields beyond the hedgerows. Bodies lay, strewn across the road where they had fallen, as though they had been dropped there out of the sky. Not one was moving and although the engine of one of the vehicles idled on, with headlights aglow, there was no signs of life from any of the people on the ground.

All except one.

And he wasn't looking too great either.

"Uncle!" he cried in a hushed whisper.

His uncle's head swung towards him far too slowly for the boy's liking and before he could be ordered otherwise, he was at his side in a burst of crouched sprinting.

"S'alright," The Major mumbled. "I got 'em all. Thanks to you."

He tapped the gun he was still holding against his thigh and gave him a bloody smile.

"Coupla bullets left if not," he told him.

"Artemis and Sophia are still hiding, we should go get them," the boy said, grabbing at his Uncle's hand and tugging on it. "Come on, get up – I'll help you..."

But Myles shook his head slightly.

"Get up!" Dom pleaded again, voice cracking slightly.

"I'm gonna need... a minute… I think," he panted. Alien against the barrage of pain signals, his legs felt strangely dead. He prayed momentarily that one of the bullets hadn't ricocheted through his torso and hit him in the spinal column, causing paralysis… then scoffed at the ridiculousness of the notion. If he was to be paralysed for the rest of his life, he didn't reckon he had very long to be upset about it.

He shuddered suddenly; pain wracking his body as he did.

He was cold.

Oh how cliche; he was cold.

He was a bit beyond ignoring what that meant.

"Tha… that's OK, then. They can wait," the youngest Butler stammered slightly, noticing his shivering and pulling his jacket from around his shoulders. "Don't talk. I'll look after you. Just keep doing big breaths."

Myles closed his eyes again. He had said almost the same when the boy had spectacularly skinned his knee chasing after a ball on hot concrete that summer. That'd been a good day. He had taken the afternoon off and they had gone to the park with Theresa. It had been such a rarity, she had nearly cried in pleasant surprise. It was her birthday. They'd had ice-cream. He'd carried Dom on his shoulders. Like a father. Blood trickling down his shin into his sock. He'd felt... happy.

"I won't go anywhere. I'm right here, see?"

"You're a good lad, Dom," he said, his heart clenching with the utter resolve in the boy's voice.

 _You're going soft, Myles._

 ** _No_** _– it's palpitations. From the bloodloss. Perfectly rational explanation._

Dom bit his lip, radiating concern as he tried the best his seven-year-old self could, to hold back the tears brimming in his eyes.

"Don't talk, OK? Just hold still…" he said, flattening in the blazer against him. "I'm going to help you."

 _Definitely just the bloodloss, right?_ he thought again, as his nephew threw himself down on his knees beside him in the dirt.

"Stop, stop – it's alright," The Major said, pushing the boy's attempts to press the treasured fabric to his chest in an effort to stem some of the catastrophic bleeding that was seeping out from every edge of the bulletproof vest. "Not your jacket – you might need that."

Dom's breathing had ratcheted up a notch and he pushed his as-of-yet small hands against the site of the wounds over the black material, as though by covering them from view he could deny they were there at all.

"But you're cold. And s'OK," he said. "I'll grow out of it soon anyway."

The Major blinked slowly, unwilling to completely relinquish the use of his vision just yet.

"You'd better do," he murmured. For growth was good. Growth meant survival. Dom would make it. Make _what_ , he was not sure. But he'd make it off this country road alive and that was more than he could dare say about himself. A thought struck him; "You said Artemis is alright, right?"

"Yeah," nodded his nephew, sniffing and wiping his face.

His hands were covered in his uncle's blood. He wiped his cheek again, making it worse.

"Good. Though you're right – you should probably go let him out now," Myles said gently. "Let them know it's safe."

"I don't want to leave you," the boy replied, clutching at him as though that would negate any order to do so.

"Go on – I… I just need a minute," the bodyguard told him again, pulling in another, painfully rattling breath. He was fairly certain he was functioning on about half a lung by now. But half was better than nothing...

"I'll get the first aid kit," Dom said suddenly, standing to make his way to the boot and berating himself for not thinking of it sooner. "I'll…"

But The Major coughed a chuckle at him.

"I think we're a bit beyond that now, Dom," he said gently. "You go and…"

 _Leave me here,_ is what he wanted to say, suddenly knowing what all gravely wounded beasts knew; that his time was short and he was overcome by a need to take himself away some place quiet and alone.

Fat chance of that in the state he was in; though he could perhaps order Dom away.

"I'm not leaving you!" the boy said, with all the beautiful stubbornness of his mother – and all the resolute defiance of his father, too.

 _Or perhaps not._

Myles could see his brother in that face. His own too, of course. But it gave him comfort to have some remnant of his twin around at the end. He wondered if you got to... find out. Was there an afterlife Beckett was waiting for him in? Or would he never know what happened to his brother?

Myles inhaled as deeply as he could, chest shaking with the effort of trying to catch his breath. He had no energy to argue. And another few minutes locked in a safe trunk wouldn't kill his charge. Might even be best if the boy stayed put until help arrived. Just in case.

"Alright," he relented. He had never had many choices to himself in his life and it looked as though whether or not he was going to be left alone to die had been taken from him as well. It was not the worst thing. "OK… sit here with me then."

He bumped his elbow against his ribs and Dom, tears beginning to escape and roll down his cheeks now, flopped down beside him in utter dejection. It had all been for nothing. His grandfather was still dead and his uncle was going to die anyway. Myles used almost the last of his strength to lift his arm over the boy and sling it around him.

"You did good today… I'm very…" he took a breath, his teeth chattering together violently. He coughed up blood and _fuck that hurt_ … "Very... proud... of you, Dom."

"Un-cle," Dom hitched, pressing his head into his shoulder.

"Hush," Myles mumbled. His jaws stopped juddering and he relaxed, letting the last of the tension ebb out of him. "Hush, now. It's alright. It's… it's gonna be… okay."

But he couldn't promise him that. He could barely finish the sentence; and even he had to admit he didn't sound at all convincing.

"Ple-ase don't l-leave me."

His nephew was sobbing now. Finally broken as he burrowed his face against the massive torso, regardless of the blood.

"P...please?"

"Now then," Myles said, his stuttering heart breaking for the boy. "What's all… this, eh? I'm going… nowhere."

One day he would be ruthless and cold. One day comrades would fall and he would seek nothing but revenge. But for now he was seven and on the brink of losing the second third of the only important adults he considered in his world. And for seeking comfort for that, Myles was never going to reprimand the boy. God knew he felt as though he could do with some himself right now.

"Don't die," Dom sniffled. " _Please_ don't die. I need you. Pa's gone already and I _need_ you! I can't… I don't want… If you're both gone… I _can't_!"

Although what exactly it was he couldn't do, he never said.

Myles licked his lips. He could really do with a drink.

 _Dehydration,_ his permanently switched-on trained side informed him. _Your brain is categorising bloodloss as a lack of body fluid. You're finished if you don't get a transfusion – pronto._

 _Cheers for that…_

"We won't be gone completely, Dom…" he breathed slowly; carefully. "Everything we taught you. That's… that's part of us. Right there. Every time you know what to do, how to get out of something. That's us; me and Pa. _That's_ how we're still with you. Protecting you… _Always_. Understood?"

Dom nodded his head, tears falling freely now.

Had they prepared him enough?

No.

No-one could have prepared a child for this; not even he and Pa.

There was always supposed to be one of them left at least to look after Dom.

Ordinary folk might have assumed that age would play a factor and that the boy's grandfather would one day no longer be there, but in their job, Myles had always known it might be him that went first. That was a given; that chance of fate. This, this was a position they had very much hoped never to be put in.

The future of their line of the Butler family relied on a part-trained pup and his as-of-yet-unconfirmed-dead, missing father.

He wanted to have taught him so much more.

He wanted to have watched him grow. To learn for himself. To come back from The Academy full of the thrill of new training and desperate to show it off.

He wanted to be there when he graduated - whenever that happened to be.

He wanted to be there when Artemis had children of his own and stand side by side with Domovoi guarding the family, just as he had with his father and his brother.

The loss of all the potential bothered him more than the bullet holes in his body.

Myles fumbled for the boy's hands, finding one tucked in amongst his battered ribcage and squeezing it tightly. The effort it took was terrifying. He didn't feel the grip of his other hand loosening, but the gun it held slipped out of his grasp and over his leg. He felt a jolt of panic – of adrenaline just enough to have his fingers scouting after it. But he needn't have worried. Almost before it hit the ground, a smaller hand reached out and snatched it, before returning to his nestled position, left hand clamping his uncle's right arm across himself, right hand folding around the acquired gun.

"That's m'boy," he mumbled.

He didn't say anything else for a good, long while. And Dom stared into the darkness, listening to his uncle's rough, shallow breaths, trying not to count them, trying to will them to keep coming, blinking to clear his vision of tears, for what felt like an eternity.

"Look at the stars, Uncle," he said, wishing more than anything to be back fixing his mum's unreliable old banger in the carpark of the flats. He hadn't wanted to talk to him then. But he did now. More than most things, he wanted to talk to him now. "There's so many. They're... they're beautiful. See? Stay awake. Just stay awake."

Myles rolled his eyes to the sky and just breathed.

There was very little light pollution out here. To the horizon, he could see the orange stain of the city. But here... here it was dark and calm and still.

Above him, the universe went on forever. You could lose yourself looking at that.

He didn't feel scared. Not for himself. He felt concern for the ones he would be leaving behind, sure. But not fear.

It would be easy enough to just...

Dom squeezed his hand tightly and he forced himself to take in another breath.

He had never been one for taking the easy way out.

Finally, eventually, the sound of engines began weaving towards them through the countryside, lighting up the route between the hedgerows.

"There's someone coming," said Dom, suddenly. "Uncle – can you hear that? There's someone coming!"

Myles said nothing. Internally, he merely hoped beyond hope that the lights and sounds heralded safety, for if it was the opposite…? Well if it was the opposite, the Fowl heir only had one Butler left in any position to protect him. And that boy was seven years old and had never so much as fired a gun on his own.

Shaking slightly, the youngest of the bodyguarding line gently removed his uncle's arm from his shoulders and tucked it against his side.

"Just wait there," he said, more for himself than anyone else. "I'll… I'll protect us, OK?"

Myles mouthed a response, but it was silent. He wanted to tell him how proud he was of him again. Of how honoured he was to have been a part of the wonderful boy's life. Of yes, how awe inspiring the stars were and thank-you for drawing his attention to how with that vast eternity all around them, and filling him with the lasting impression that there had to be something more to living than just dying at the end...

But he couldn't.

He couldn't do anything but lie there whilst his heart pounded its way to its own demise.

* * *

A car drew to a swift stop a little way down the road, back towards town. One person leapt from it and moved with guarded haste towards them. Dom brought his other hand up to the gun and held it out – the apex of a triangle made by his arms and for a moment he could almost feel the weight of his uncle's – or perhaps it was his grandfather's – arms around his, shielding him from the recoil.

But there was no-one to shield him now. He was on his own. The safety was off and he was completely in charge of defending their little group.

He pointed the gun at a living thing for the first time in his life.

"Stay back," he said, wishing his voice was several octaves deeper. "I am armed and prepared to use deadly force if necessary."

He stumbled the last word slightly, which rather put a kilter on his warning, but the man approaching heard all the same and slowed, raising his hands.

"Good," rumbled the stranger. "A little theatrical, perhaps, but I blame your relatives for that."

Dom's arms dropped immediately, his legs suddenly feeling very shaky as he recognised the silhouette against the new car's headlights.

His cry of surprise was enough to make The Major forced his eyes open once more and when he saw his nephew rush to embrace the man towering above him, his whole body relaxed with a sigh.

But his mind didn't.

He shook his head slowly.

"I was expecting Beckett," he mumbled, rolling his gaze upwards to lock eyes with the newcomer, who did nothing to dislodge the boy who had buried his face in his midriff.

"Who would come for you at the end?" the giant mused, stroking the boy's head gently. "It'd be appropriate, I suppose. If he were dead."

"He's not?"

The man would know by now, surely?

"I'd like to think so. And neither are you – yet."

"I'm not coming with you," he said, as firmly as he could muster. "Not yet."

In reality he was mumbling, barely coherently, but it was what he _meant_ to say.

The giant eyed him with a stare as dark as the night sky between the brightest stars.

"So you're just going to sit here muttering to yourself then, are you?"

The Major closed his eyes and jerked his head, just once.

"Got to say, m'boy," the man said. "Doesn't seem like much of a plan."

"No plan… They… need me," he rasped.

"Where are the charges?"

"Safe," he breathed. Glad at least to be able to give him that news.

"Artemis and Sophia are in the car under the seats. Mr and Mrs Fowl are with the Simmons and their guards," Dom elaborated for him.

"Right. Good. Now don't you worry about them, son," said the newcomer, addressing Myles now. "Stand down. Let me take over from here."

"I can't go with you…" The Major repeated. "Not yet."

But the man drew closer anyway.

"Well I can't very well just leave you here."

"Not… yet," he begged of him, knowing what seeing this man must mean. "I'm trying…"

 _I'm trying to hold on for them,_ is what he wanted to say, but he couldn't speak anymore. He took another breath that was nowhere near as deep as he needed it to be. There was definitely a lot more liquid in his throat than should be there.

 _It's in your lungs, not your throat, idiot._

"Yes, well _keep_ bloody-well trying," growled the man, gently pushing the young boy clinging to his waist away from him as he assessed the damage. "In, out, in, out – come on now, breathing's not hard, man; you've been doing it all your life."

Myles thought that was an odd thing for a spectre of death to be saying. His vision was blurring, but the hallucination seemed more vivid than ever. The entire left side of its skull was a crimson horror show, the white of his eye glaring in the moonlight. He seemed so _real_. Even Dom seemed to be completely acknowledging the other man.

 _Wait… Did that mean…?_

"Dom," he said suddenly, flailing his arm towards the boy suddenly. "Are you OK? What happened?"

In his version of events they had survived, right? Dom certainly had. Did this mean he was wrong? He could barely focus on breathing, let alone a full recall of recent events. Dom was _definitely_ acknowledging the other man. Did that mean he was dying too? Dead already? Where was Artemis? And the Simmons girl?

"I'm fine," Dom said, dropping to the floor beside him again, gripping his hand tightly. "I'm right here, Uncle. It's gonna be OK now."

"Just rest," the spectre said from above. "They're coming."

The Major nodded, finally, gritting his teeth. He wasn't getting out of this one. He didn't know who _'they'_ were, but he had a certainty of knowledge that they'd be the ones to release him from this pain – for surely there would be? One final release at least, from the suffering he found himself in. But it wasn't lessening any. Surely it was supposed to? Please, _please_ don't let this be it for the rest of forever. His breath hitched painfully and he coughed blood again, drooling thick strings of stained saliva and growling against the agony, barely managing to keep himself from gasping into hyperventilation, which surely would have been the end of any attempt at breathing unassisted.

"Kingdom, would you go look for the ambulance, please?" said their companion. "When they eventually catch up, they'll need directing. Damn civilians and their driving skills…"

"But…"

"No buts, **_vnuk_**. Now, please."

"Don't die. Just don't die, OK?" Dom sniffed as squeezed his arms around his uncle's shoulders in a hasty hug, then did as he was bid.

Myles frowned. What the hell was going on here?

He wondered if any of it was real.

 _Your mind is conjuring pleasant images to distract you from the inevitable, idiot._

A solid hand landed on his shoulder.

The giant it belonged to sighed, appraising the damage. There wasn't a lot he could do without equipment. Even stripping him of his vest could aggravate an injury. The best thing he could do was sit very still and calmly until the medical professionals arrived with their gear.

"Well, lad…" he said. "You've really outdone yourself this time."

Very solid. _Corporal_.

 _Pretty good hallucination._

"P…Pa?" he stammered at last. "But… you were shot… I saw you die… I saw…you..."

He didn't want to put into words what he had seen.

His father, lying motionless. Eyes rolled in his head. Blood soaking into the carpet from a catastrophic head wound. A bullet through the head. Unavoidable. Untreatable. Dead. Definitely, unequivocally _dead_.

The behemoth looming over him snorted his trademark, deadpan snort.

"The man looks as though he doesn't know this isn't the first time his father has survived a headshot," he smiled, tracing a shining, white scar on his right temple with one finger; it would soon be mirrored on the left. "Anyone would think I hadn't raised him from birth."

"Pa," Myles choked again, grasping for the hand on his shoulder, desperate to confirm the impossible. "You're not…"

Relief flooded through him.

Not only for his father, but for Dom.

There was someone to look after Dom. He wouldn't be leaving him on his own.

There came too, the relief that the man provided simply by his very presence, but Myles was too savvy to extend the relief to his own wellbeing. He was way past saving and his father could do nothing to stop that.

But he was alive.

Dom would be OK.

"Not _dead_ , yes. Remarkable, isn't it?" said Alexandr Butler derisively, making a quick surveillance of the scene to ensure none of the downed men were about to make a similarly miraculous return to life. "I'm very much alive. Thanks – as I'm in no doubt you're in agreement with – to our young pup."

 _H…how?_ Myles only mouthed the word but his father read it all the same.

"I moved my head to speak to Little Kingdom," he explained. "Moved it by an inch and the bullet grazed my skull instead of passing through it. Messy? Yes. Bitch of a headache? Oh definitely. Am I missing a few millimetres of bone material? Almost certainly. Instant and prolonged unconsciousness and one hell of a concussion, I presume. But no; I didn't die. And you better not either now, My-Boy, or I swear I'll come drag you back by your ankles – understood?"

Myles didn't understand at all, but he nodded. He felt his heart stutter and he inhaled sharply.

"Pa," he panted, urgently. "I c…c…can't br… bre…"

Xandr dropped to his knees, checking over his shoulder swiftly for threats before he clasped his hands either side of The Major's head, forcing him to look at him.

"Pa... help... m..."

He knew as soon as he said it he was asking the impossible.

This was it.

This was the end.

"Hush, quiet now," he said. "Save your energy."

The younger bodyguard clawed for his father's hands, fingers fumbling as he mouthed wordlessly.

" _Myles,_ " he said lowly, his stare a strange mix of stern and concerned. "Stay with me, boy. _Stay with_ _me_."

Myles opened and closed his mouth, shaking his head, a mixture of air and blood catching and crackling in his throat as he struggled valiantly to keep breathing.

"It's alright," Xandr told him, fingers jamming under his jaw to feel for the state of his pulse, cupping the back of his head to hold him upright, forcing him to look straight into his eyes. "It's alright, **_syn_** ; I've got you. I've got you. Just relax. Just breathe."

But his son clenched his teeth in pain, his back arching, eyes losing focus and he slumped away from his grip, heavily.

Xandr swore, grabbing him by the belt and dragging him flat against the tarmacked surface. If his head hit the floor a little hard, that was the last of his worries now. Ripping open his shirt, he unstrapped the battered ballistic vest and flung it open.

" ** _Blyad!_** "

If they weren't dead already at his own hand, Alexandr would have slaughtered the men who did this to his son. His torso was like a sieve and to say he had lost a lot of blood would be a grave understatement. But his heart was still in one piece and Xandr had to assume that he would have bled out a lot quicker had any of the bullets hit a major artery. Potentially, the reason for this cardiac arrest was a toxic combination of bloodloss and shock.

There was an ambulance on its way, he could hear it. Sirens wailing to a stop. Doors clunking open. Dom calling to them, urgently.

They would have a defibrillator and the necessary drugs available to him in a matter of a few more seconds.

For one more moment he looked down at the deathly still body and saw, for the first time in a long time, a completely untroubled expression on his youngest son's face.

He wondered if he was making the right decision.

Then he placed one massive hand over the other in the centre of his son's chest and began to pump.

* * *

 **He lives! Of course I couldn't kill off Xandr. He is definitely my favourite AF OC. He writes himself. He's just that awesome.**

 **Points to all of those of you who spotted I had to have some loophole twist in there because he appears in things chronologically after this fic in the** **Wolfy Butler!Verse timeline.**

 **Also, as many of you have pointed out, Myles must make it... It's just _how_... right?**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**

 **11/12/18**


	8. Chapter 7 - Repercussions

**Thanks to: _Shadow914, Jolinnn, Spencerblue, kunoichi, Fowl Fox_ (yes, make yourself an account - go for it! I'll read your fics and review!) _Alchemechanist_ (x3, thank-you so much for reviewing every chapter since the last time you reviewed!) and as always, _Steinbock_.**

 **Also, I forgot who asked but Pa calls Dom 'Kingdom' and sometimes 'Little Kingdom' because it stemmed from him calling him 'My Little King Dom' as a baby - based on the fact that he sees him as the only hope to their continuation of their branch of the Butler family tree, since he's fairly certain Myles isn't going to be bringing anything useful to the table. So in a roundabout way he's their heir to the kingdom - although that kingdom mainly consists of ensuring Fowls don't go extinct...**

 **WARNINGS: Long and kinda slow chapter. It was two slow chapters so I've banged it into one for more interesting content. If you're really into the little nuances and snippets that build the relationships between all the characters for future chapters and fics, then I think you're going to like it. If you just want a good action blast... I apologise. We've had that bit for now. Here, have some more gruff!fluff instead.**

* * *

 **CHAPTER SEVEN**

 **"REPERCUSSIONS"**

 _ **Definition: Unintended consequences of an event or action**_

 **Fowl Manor, Dublin**

Dom shook against his mother's side as she rocked him gently. He was washed and warm and dry, but still he shivered and felt sick to his core; every time he closed his eyes images of horror and fear flashed onto his eyelids. He hadn't let her turn the lamp off.

"Hush, my baby boy," she murmured, smoothing his hair gently. "Let it go. Just rest now. Just sleep."

She had come immediately, of course. She had left work – and was fairly certain she'd be fired upon return but if 'family emergency' wasn't a good enough excuse this close to Christmas then screw it, she'd find another job. She had been due to arrive at the manor within the week anyway, but Eugene Fowl did not use a telephone; he had 'people' for that. She had already made up her mind she was leaving when the name left her colleagues mouth as she handed Theresa the phone. If Eugene Fowl was using a telephone to contact _her_ of all people, something was drastically, _drastically_ wrong. He had said very little over the phone, only to come as quickly as she could and not to stop for anyone or anything. Harson would be at the gates to let her in, he had said. When she had asked why it would be him – when Myles always insisted on doing that sort of thing himself – the hesitation had been all she had needed to be on the way almost before she hung up the phone.

Harson had indeed let her in and the fact he looked even more sullen than usual and did not even so much as make some snide remark about her late-night visiting, put her so much more on edge that when at last she had at last burst through the manor doors, she had almost thrown herself on the Fowl couple stood in the hall behind it.

"Where's my son?" she demanded frantically. "Where is he?"

"He's safe," Vivienne said immediately, understanding a mother's need to hear that of her child. She had been just the same before she had managed to gather Artemis to her bosom once more and squeeze him until he had complained of bruised ribs and told her she was being _quite_ unnecessary as he held back tears of relief that both of his parents were alright. "He's fine, Theresa. Shaken, but unharmed."

The medic who had checked Artemis and Sophia over had said the same. The Simmons were staying the night with them at the manor, but had retired to one of the guest rooms – all three laid together in a king-sized bed, fearful despite the Fowl's manor security team being on high alert. The host family themselves were not feeling as safe as they usually did either; not without their two top security staff.

"Tell me where he is," said Theresa, daring them to delay her any further.

"We will," Eugene said, as gently as he could – tact was not his strong point and he was barely recovering from the healthy dose of shock he had received when his bodyguard had called him from the hospital hours after apparently being rendered deceased in front of his very eyes. "But first, Ms Brady, I'm afraid we must inform you there's been a serious incident and…"

"The 'serious incident' can wait unless you want another one – where is my son?!" she almost snarled.

"Theresa, please – a moment," Vivienne reached for her arm gently.

But Theresa was having none of it. She didn't want to hear what had happened, she wanted her son and she wanted him in her arms. _Now_.

"Ma?"

Dom's voice echoed from the upstairs landing and they rushed for eachother, meeting halfway at the landing on the flight of stairs. He had not yet changed out of his suit and she gripped him tightly, fearing what the state of the expensive material meant.

"Oh my baby," she breathed in relief as she kissed his face, stroked his hair – which was encrusted in dried blood that was not his own – and checked him over for any damage a doctor may have overlooked, running her hands over his arms and torso, feeling for his strong, young heart pounding firmly under his bloodied shirt. "Oh my boy, what happened to you?"

And it was that which broke him.

He had been doing so well to remain stoic and calm throughout the trip to the hospital in the ambulance with his miraculously revived grandfather and the paramedics working tirelessly to resuscitate the last vestiges of the steadily ebbing life of his uncle. He had managed not to cry when the doctors had gently pried his grip from his uncle's hand at the hospital's A&E doors, with repeated promises of 'We'll do what we can for your daddy, son – but you've got to let us do our job now'. He'd wanted to say that he wasn't his dad, but it didn't matter. For all intents and purposes, he was. And that's how he felt now; in desperate need of a parent. And so when his mother held him close to her chest and told him it was all alright and she would look after him now and he wanted to believe her so much it hurt... he collapsed entirely into broken, hitching sobs, shaking and crying in her arms and it was all she could do to hold him steady on those grand stairs of Fowl Manor.

She held him close, standing and looking down on the Fowls over her son's head.

"It's The Major, isn't it?" she said quietly, knowing in her heart even before the saddened nods came that it was.

She felt as though the stair's carpet had been torn out from under her and taken her stomach with it. The world stood still momentarily, everything falling away into nothingness. Everything, that was, but the warm, crumpling frame of her son, shaking in the grip of her arms.

She had known this would happen one day. She had known from the day she had started caring about him that it could. He would be ripped away from her by virtue of his own life's work.

Gone. Just like Beckett. Lost, forever.

"Idiot," she whispered, bitterly as the tears began to stream down her face and she held Dom close to her, willing herself to be strong for her boy. "Damn that stupid, _stupid_ …"

"He's not dead, **_doch'_** ," the most comforting voice she could have hoped to hear right now rumbled as he made his way down the stairs towards them.

She turned and gasped at the sight of him, but pulled her son with her as she reached to embrace him one-armed.

"Jesus! What the f..."

"I'm fine. Don't worry."

"Fine?! What the hell happened to you?!"

"I got myself shot in the head," he shrugged. "But I'm ok now."

"Shot in the... How?"

"Well, someone fired a gun at me. But it's OK - they missed."

Theresa decided she'd ask again later. There was more information she needed first. Information about someone who was unavoidably _not here_.

"My… The Major's not dead?" she repeated, desperate to clarify. "He's _not_ dead?"

"No. He's not good – but he's not dead. Yet."

Theresa took a proper breath. She could work with 'not good'. She could even work with 'yet'. She could work with anything that was 'not dead'.

"Take the evening, Butler," Eugene called from the bottom of the stairs, as though the man needed the order. "Tomorrow too. Hell, the whole week if you need it."

"Thank-you, sir," Xandr said, with a nod. "With respect, may I suggest you get some rest?"

"Yes… yes, I will," he muttered absentmindedly, and the bodyguard knew that the man would do no such thing until he had worked out a way to get back at the people who had attacked his family.

They had not yet had the _conversation_ the Fowl patriarch knew would be happening before long. Why had he gone with the Simmons guards instead of waiting for The Major? Why had he left his son behind when he did? They were all things the Butler would want to know. A blow-by-blow of every decision, every moment after he had been taken out of action. It sounded as though his charge needed some 'apocalypse situation' training. This situation, if nothing else, had made them all stop and realise that the Butlers were not, despite evidence to the contrary, entirely invincible. There had to be a better 'Plan B' in the event of their incapacitation, than 'wander off with the next nearest security team'. He would have his reasons. Butler would listen. It did not necessarily mean he had to agree.

"Mrs Fowl," he rumbled, inclining his head. "Will you be so kind as to assist my charge with my request?"

They had a long-standing partnership when it came to keeping Eugene Fowl in the best of health and Vivienne nodded as with a sad smile she took hold of her husband's arm.

"Certainly Butler," she said, steering the muttering head of the Fowls towards the west-wing staircase and their room.

They watched them go, standing in uneasy silence on the stairs. Dom had fallen quiet again, his eyes staring blankly into the middle distance.

"What happened?" Theresa said at last.

"You take care of Dom first," Xandr said, clasping the back of his grandson's head gently for a moment, thumbing the blood-encrusted hair. "Then we'll talk. Take as long as you need – I'm going to clean myself up, then I'll come find you."

That had been earlier. Before she had scrubbed Dom down in the shower - for the first time in a fair few years now, the independent little git that he was - before she had washed the swirling crimson dregs from the bath and wrapped him in one of the Fowl's big, fluffy towels. Before he had dried and dressed himself and she had tucked him into bed and enclosed him in the warm, safe haven of her arms.

There was a light knock on the door and Theresa murmured a response. She would have perhaps been irritated at the interruption in her attempts to get her son to sleep, but she knew who it was. Besides, as she had expected, Dom's eyes glinted in the light that spilled through the door – they were still wide open; refusing to rest.

She moved her feet, allowing the Butler to sit on the end of the bed. Dom unclenched his fist from her shirt and reached for him silently. Xandr gave him his hand to hold.

"Can't sleep, eh, **_detenysh_**?"

The boy shook his head with a sniff.

"It does help if you close your eyes…" he rebuked, gently, with a raised eyebrow. It hurt to make the facial expression, not that he made any external sign of it. He had dressed and taped the damage left behind by the bullet meant to kill him. It could do with some more attention, if he was honest. But he would swallow his pride and ask Theresa later. For now, his priority - as always - was not himself.

Dom blinked at him, eyeing the head dressing. He had not spoken another word since calling out to his mother and Alexandr was concerned for what this elective mutism may mean for future post-traumatic stress symptoms. But that was a concern for later. He had plenty to be getting on with right now.

"Are you comfortable?"

The boy shrugged and Xandr turned to Theresa.

"May I?" he said, gesturing to move closer.

"Of course," she said, shuffling over to make room.

The giant slid further back on the bed until he was against the wall behind them, he and Dom's mother arranging the boy so that he was tucked between them in the blanket she had covered him in.

"Now then. I know you're scared. And that's ok," Xandr rumbled softly. "I'm scared too."

Dom pushed himself up to look at him, confused. This was a revelation. This was his grandfather. The Great Butler. He did not get... _scared_.

"I know you find that hard to believe," he said, with a soft snort. "But I am. That's OK. Fear is normal. It's how you react to it that counts. None of us want to lose your uncle, Kingdom. But lying here awake fretting yourself sick isn't going to help anybody. We will wait for news. _Then_ we will react to it. Worrying never improved a situation, **_moy vnuk_**."

The boy was still silent. Theresa ran her fingers through his thick, damp hair, stroking his forehead.

"Try to relax, sweetheart. Just for a minute. Just a few hours rest, OK?"

Dom closed his eyes, but that was as far as he got. Theresa shot Xandr a helpless look and the giant let out a great sigh, stretching his arm around her shoulders and pulling them all in together in a huddle.

And then, quite unexpectedly Theresa thought, he began to sing, in a low murmuring melody;

 ** _"Spi mladyenets, moi prekrasný,_** ** _  
bayushki bayu,  
tikho smotrit myesyats yasný  
f kolýbyel tvayu.  
Stanu skazývat' ya skazki,  
pyesenki spayu,  
tý-zh dremli, zakrývshi glazki,  
Bayushki bayu._**

 ** _Terek bezhit po skalistoy krovati,_** ** _  
I bryzgayet yego temnaya volna,  
Po beregam beretsya lukavyy razboynik,  
Zatochka kinzhala,  
No tvoy otets - staryy voin,  
Zatverdevshiy v boyu,  
Tak spat', moya dorogaya, bezmyatezhnost',  
Bayushki bayu._**

 ** _Sim uznayesh, budit vremya,  
branoye zhityo,  
smyelo vdyenish nogu f stremya  
i vazmyosh ruzhyo.  
Ya sedeltse boyevoye  
sholkom razoshyu.  
Spi, ditya mayo radnoye,  
bayushki bayu._**

 ** _Spi, mladyenets, moi prekrasný,_** ** _  
bayushki bayu."_**

By the time he had repeated it twice over, his grandson's breathing had settled and his relatively small frame had relaxed. Xandr ran a rough thumb over his forehead, smoothing the last of the trademark Butler scowl from his young brow.

"I didn't know you could sing," Theresa said softly, leaning her head back onto his solid shoulder.

"I have my talents," he smirked. "Although I'm not sure singing is one of them."

"Well I thought it was beautiful."

The giant grunted noncommittally, seeming almost embarrassed, if that was possible.

"It's a Russian lullaby?" she asked, quietly.

"Yes," Xandr murmured. "There's another few verses, but they're not as happy."

"That's ok," she whispered. "I can't really understand you anyway. Bits and bats, but not all of it."

"Perhaps, but Dom has kept up with his bilingual lessons more than you, **_moya dorogaya doch'_** ," he chided gently.

"True," she smiled. "I'm sorry. What Is it about?"

"A mother," he said simply. "Singing her son to sleep."

"Like your mother to you?"

"I suppose."

"What is she singing about?"

"About how his father is a soldier and she's proud he'll be a soldier too one day," he said. "And worried."

"Oh."

"Appropriate, eh?" he said, rolling his shoulder under her head.

She stayed uncomfortably silent, so he added;

"It's just a lullaby, 'Resa."

"Did your wife sing it to your boys?"

He snorted quietly at the notion. "My Maud? Sing? No. But I did. As she would tell you; I was always the soft one of the two of us."

"I believe it," Theresa smiled. "Maud… Interesting name."

"Hmm. Don't tell her I let that slip."

"Oh… I didn't know she was still…ah…"

"Alive? Yes she is. Last I heard."

"Last you _heard?_ " she frowned, jolting his shoulder slightly as she looked up at him. "It must be hard to live like that – when did you last see her?"

He huffed in contemplation. "Oh two... maybe three years ago."

"Two or… What? Why?"

The boy between them shifted slightly at her surprised question and the giant hushed her.

"It's how it is," he said, calmly. "It works."

"Works? Pa, she's your _wife_ …"

"And I'm very lucky to be able to call her that," he said, simply.

Theresa sighed. It was this she would never get used to; the complete and utter dedication to the job.

"Besides," he admitted. "She probably would have killed me by now if our arrangement was more… traditional."

"How to you mean?" she said, frowning and smiling at the same time.

"She ah… she likes to test her produce. Get an idea of dosage. Me and the boys are her favourite subjects. We're bigger than average, fast metabolisms… Ideal candidates."

"For what?"

"Oh, never anything too dangerous. Poisoning, sedatives and the likes… I personally have built up quite a resistance to kratom resin," he said, matter-of-factly. "So whereas I would sing to the boys, she… well, she would probably be more likely to slip them some kava or the likes."

Theresa was almost sure he was joking, but the thought of 'the boys' made her throat tighten again.

"I don't have any handy myself, or else I would consider giving us both some kava tea right about now."

He yawned massively and shifted as though to move. She clutched his arm briefly.

"Would you… would you stay? Just for a while. I just… I mean Dom's just settled. I don't want to wake him."

He sighed.

"This will do wonders for my poor old back, I'm sure," he grumbled. "Between that and hauling Myles' lazy backside off the tarmac this evening it'll be a wonder if I can move tomorrow…"

Theresa could see it in her minds eye; Alexandr helping paramedics to load the enormous, limp form of Myles onto a stretcher, warning them of his tendency to decline medical treatment, sternly chastising his son for any attempt to… She was not far off, except that there had been no resistance to the aid from the 120 kilo plus deadweight he had lifted bodily onto the stretcher and a whole lot more rushing around and revival attempts from the medics.

Xandr stretched as though he had decided the matter already… But he stayed. Of course he did. He yawned again like an enormous, drowsy bear and she snuggled more comfortably against his side, tucking her son close between them protectively. And together, they slept.

* * *

 **Undisclosed Hospital, Dublin**

The nurses didn't speak to them.

They just looked on at them with politely saddened gazes as the matron of the Intensive Care Unit ward quietly but efficiently directed them to the side room.

They had been given all the information the staff could provide them with about Myles' condition, his prognosis, plans for future surgeries, the likelihood for full recovery... It had been some grim listening.

"He's not conscious," she told them, not unkindly. "But I can assure you, he's being kept comfortable – he's not in any pain at the moment."

"And when…" Theresa said, since Xandr had merely nodded an acknowledgement and gone on ahead through the door. "When do you think it will be possible to… you know, try see if he'll _regain_ consciousness?"

The matron reached out and squeezed her elbow just for a second.

"Well I think he's in for a bit of a journey, sweetheart," she said, smiling sadly at her. "But he seems like a strong one, so we're hopeful for some steady improvement over the next few weeks."

She meant it kindly, but the timeframe she gave made Theresa baulk at the door-handle. What state exactly was her invincible, stalwart friend on the other side of that door? Alexandr hadn't given her much more information than 'he was alive when I last saw him' – perhaps unwilling to diverge more in the face of his own denial at his son's condition.

"You can speak to him, you know?" said the woman, as she stood, frozen in the hallway. "They say people can hear you. If that brings you comfort."

Theresa nodded, numbly. But except for official qualifications, she could be a nurse. She would know by opening the door just how bad the consequences of Myles's life-saving antics were going to be for him long-term and she knew that the head nurse was merely sugar-coating her own diagnosis.

She opened the door.

Xandr Butler didn't even look up. He was sat on the far side of the bed so that he could still see the door – still defend his son from further attackers – and it hit her even more than the machinery Myles was all-but-encased in, that he had folded one giant paw around his boy's.

It was that that broke her. A single sob of shock and anger escaped her as the door clicked shut, locking her in the room with the nightmare.

"Come – sit, **_moya doch'_**."

But she couldn't. Not yet. Instead she went to the end of the bed and, glancing only briefly at the pseudonym they had used for him, flashed her eyes over the statistics in Myles's medical file.

"I thought he always wore a vest?" she said, almost accusingly.

"He does. And you should see the state of _that_ ," Xandr told her. "He was lucky to get away with just the seven getting through it."

"Liver damage, left lung puncture, ruptured stomach lining… Is there an organ they didn't hit? Oh, he's still got a functioning pancreas, thank fuck for that…"

"Pancreases are important."

For one moment she looked at him in utter disbelief as she suddenly realised that maybe Beckett was not such a complete **_belaya vorona_** of the family as Myles had once described him. She could almost hear him saying; 'You should get that printed on a t-shirt'.

"I want to see the x-rays and the surgeon's report," she said bluntly. "And I want to speak to his surgeon."

Myles had already been through several hours of surgery just to stabilise him enough for the intensive care staff to take over. Whoever had been in charge of that would have an opinion, and she wanted to hear it.

"They're not going to show us the x-rays just because we demand to see them, 'Resa," Xandr said, gently. "The surgeon will talk to us in due time, I'm sure. But we must have patience."

"Due time? They'd better speak to us. There's a note here about spinal cord damage… Did they say anything about paralysis?"

Xandr placed one finger over his lips with a pointed nod at his son. "Let's not jump to any conclusions."

He didn't want Myles getting any wind of something like that. Willpower was likely all that was keeping the man alive. Well, that, and the life-support machine he was hooked up to.

She scowled and read through the list of drugs he was on, frowning deeper with every line.

"They're giving him too much morphine – I agree; most people don't have his level of pain tolerance, but he can have a welfare-level of comfort on half that dosage. It's probably really not helping his breathing being on that much, either. Oxycodone would work better for him in this case. And there's no need to give him that much sedative, either; two thirds of that dose should keep him under, even if he is fighting the ventilator, which I presume is why they've put him under so deep… But if he's fighting to breathe for himself, we keep him in an induced coma? Management? He's stubborn but he's not that dumb. Not with god knows how many bullet holes in him and... fuck it. I just feel so helpless. I hate this."

"'Resa, we have to let the professionals handle this one, remember?" he said, infuriatingly reasonable and calm.

"I used to treat his identical twin, _remember_!" she retorted, sliding the clipboard back with a sharp snap. "I know how this _exact same body_ metabolises what they're pumping into him and I know what works best for it too!"

Xandr raised one hand placatingly.

"I am aware. You don't need to tell me. Believe me, his mother would not have him on half of these drugs either. Now sit down," he said firmly. "Please."

She did, pulling a chair up and throwing herself down into it opposite the man who had welcomed her into his family more readily than either of his sons ever had. He was just as maddening as either of them, but she was so, so grateful not to be going through this alone. So, so grateful he had somehow survived impossible odds to be here, exuding his special brand of ' _que sera sera'_ and generally being the rock they all needed right now.

They sat in silence until she had calmed down enough to sigh and run a hand through her hair. It needed washing – as though that was the most of her worries right now...

"He's... He's worse than I thought," she whispered, mirroring the elder bodyguard and curling her fingers through Myles's as they lay on the bedsheet then wrapping the other hand over the top.

"You think I would have managed to keep him from walking home from the crime scene if he wasn't?"

"I just mean..." she bit her lip and shook her head, unable to say it.

"It's…" Xandr sighed, picking his words. "It is not looking good, I'll admit."

He didn't seem angry, or upset. He didn't seem like his world was in turmoil and inside his head was nothing but a constant screaming that this could not be happening, this was not going to happen. It was not part of the plan. He had - stubbornly - refused every to put much thought into this eventuality. The apparent loss of one son had hit him hard. The definite loss of his remaining son... Externally, he was still. Very calm, and very, very still.

They sat in silence for what felt like a long time, the machines droning their solemn melodies into their subconscious; a permanent reminder even when they closed their eyes, that all was not well in their world.

Eventually, Xandr checked his watch and rose to his feet.

"I need to speak to the matron," he said. "Will you be ok here for a moment?"

Theresa nodded and he squeezed her shoulder gently as he passed on the way to the door.

It clicked softly as it closed behind him, thudding into the frame and sealing her in the room alone with her friend. Her best friend. The one who knew how to torment her more than anyone else. The one who would do anything for her. The one who had got her through all these years raising Dom as a single parent in a world that did not give one iota that she had not come into her situation through her own doing, nor that she had had her version of a perfect life lined up until the point of Beckett's disappearance. Circumstance had brought them together - two worlds that would never otherwise have intertwined. But here she was. Sat at the bedside of the brother of the man she had loved enough to embark on a mission to find, when so many others would have written him off as no good...

"Oh shit, Myles," she whispered, raising his hand to her forehead and holding it there with both of hers, curling his fingers in on themselves into a fist, for she knew he would never willingly let her hold his hand for long had he had been awake. "Why do you do this to me?"

The only answer was a beep from the heart monitor. She glanced at it and sighed.

"Please don't give up on me, alright?" she asked him. "Don't give up on us. Dom needs his uncle. Pa needs his son. Artemis needs his bodyguard back. I... I need you. We _all_ need you. And…"

She felt the tears welling up and kissed his battered knuckles with a loud sniff.

"… I can't go through this again, Mylo. I just can't. I can't lose you like we lost Beckett. I think… I think it…" she held back a sob, not quite wanting to say what she was thinking, but needing him to know it all the same. Until now, she didn't think she could ever feel something as close to what losing Beckett had felt like. "I think it would be _worse_."

A single tear trickled down her cheek and onto the back of his hand, rolling down his wrist until it soaked into one of the very many dressings he was bound in.

"At least with Beck there's a chance…" she took a deep breath, composing herself before Xandr returned. "Please don't let there be no chance of you coming back to us. Don't let that happen. Be the stubborn git I know and love."

She screwed her eyes shut and pulled his loose fist close to her chest, hugging his forearm whilst she couldn't hug the rest of his bound and bandaged body.

The door opened quietly and Xandr leaned through it, hand on the handle.

"Come on," he said, gently. "We should be getting back. Kingdom will be waiting for us."

Theresa nodded, squeezing Myles's still hand tightly for a moment before she let go, placing it carefully on the bed beside him.

"Do you think we should let him see him?"

Xandr's mouth was a thin line as he breathed out heavily through his nostrils.

"We'll see what he's like tomorrow. I don't think it'd do him much harm and I wouldn't want **_mladshiy_** to miss seeing him if…"

"Don't say it," she interrupted. "Please."

"Saying it won't increase or decrease its likelihood, **_dorogaya 'doch_** ," he sighed.

"I just don't want to hear it," she sniffed. "You saying it feels like admitting it and…"

She didn't need to finish the sentence. He understood.

"Come on," he said, taking her under his wing and steering her out into the corridor.

They both looked back, though it went unnoticed by the man they stared at.

* * *

They left Myles to the thrumming and beeping of the machines and made their way out of the intensive care unit and out into the main corridors of the hospital. Theresa was walking on auto-pilot, mentally putting together the treatment plan she would subject Myles to if it was down to her when they reached a T-junction and suddenly Xandr was not by her side.

"Oh…" she said, frowning. For he would be right – he was always right. "Sorry; I was distracted I thought it was this way…"

But the giant paused too, flicking his eyes to read a sign on the wall.

She noticed him squinting.

"Are you alright?"

"Mhm," he grunted. "Just…"

He put a hand out to the wall suddenly and she rushed to his side.

"No, no – don't you try holding me up – I'll crush you!" he rebuked her efforts, steadying himself and blowing out a long, slow breath through pursed lips.

Loss of sense of direction, lapses in concentration, blurred vision, dizzy spells, nausea – that headache she knew was coming on stronger by the second by the slight scowl of pain he gave when he gritted his teeth.

"Your concussion is worse than you told me," she accused, looking around for something for him to sit down on.

"Of course it's worse than I told you," he scoffed. "Why on Earth would I tell you how I really felt? I'm a Butler; my boys had to get it from somewhere, remember?"

She knew he was trying to lighten the mood, to put her at ease with his self-ridiculing, to bait her into telling him that she was fully aware of any Butlers' penchant for downplaying serious injury. But she wasn't having it today.

"Let me look at you," she said, firmly.

"I'll be fine," he replied, firmer still, touching his fingers to the dressing plastered to the side of his skull. "A shot to the head leaving one a little woozy is to be expected, I'd imagine."

"You shouldn't be driving," she warned.

He said nothing, steeling himself with another breath before he set off at his usual striding pace, daring her to pass further comment on his capabilities. Which would have worked out just fine for him had he not immediately decked it around the next corner.

"Pa!"

" ** _Chert voz'mi…_** " he muttered, pausing on his knees for a moment whilst the floor stopped spinning. "Some use I am now if we get attacked…"

"Please just stay down for a minute…" she begged, kneeling next to him. The were alone in the corridor for now, but any minute someone would find them and then he would either have to explain himself or put up a bloody good act to get out of being whisked away to the triage desk some floors below.

"Stay down, my arse…" he grunted, planting one hand on a row of metal chairs bolted to the wall beside him.

"Fine," she said, glaring at him. She was well-used to stubborn; Butler males as he said, after all. "Stay down or I'm driving us home."

He scowled, taking the hand off the bench.

"Good. Now just sit down with your back against the wall for a moment and…"

She almost didn't catch the keys he hooked out of his pocket and tossed to her.

"You do _not_ ," he growled, hauling himself up off his knees. "Drive her like you drive that rust bucket of yours, understood?"

That was another thing about Butler males; their over-attachment to inanimate vehicles and weaponry.

"Shit _me_ …" she said slowly. "You really _are_ concussed."

* * *

 **Fowl Manor, Dublin**

If Harson was surprised to see the woman behind the wheel of Butler's, he wisely said nothing of it.

"You should rest," she told Xandr as they made their way indoors.

"I'll sleep when I'm dead," he grunted.

"Which will be a lot sooner than billed if you don't look after yourself," she said, seriously.

"Thank-you for your concern, but really; I will be fine," he assured her. "I have some things to do, but if you tell Junior we'll take him tomorrow, I'll clear it with the Fowls. If you think… you know. You're his mother. If you think it right."

"What I think is that he'll hate me if I don't," she said absently, still staring up at him. "Are you sure you won't let me take another look at your head? I want to check you over. Please."

He sighed.

"Fine. You can check me over again later if you're still worried, alright? It's just a concussion."

"There's no such thing as 'just a concussion'," she said. "You worry me."

"Don't quote me to me," Xandr scowled with a snort. "Worry you indeed..."

She smiled weakly, still looking concerned and he made his way upstairs.

He was fairly certain she already knew he had no such plans of letting her back anywhere near his head with a torch and antiseptic cream, but he was grateful she let him go anyway.

Once he made it to his room, he locked the door and unlocked his wall-safe, peeling a piece of tape away from the underside of one of the shelves and rubbing the key clean of sticky residue. Then he opened his wardrobe and lifted the base out carefully. It had been quite some time and the wood creaked in protest as he eased it free of its housing.

Underneath was a large, metal safe box which he opened with the small key, then in that a coded container. He keyed in the passcode automatically, tapping each of the keys in turn before he pressed the ones he required; to negate a crafty safe-cracker from picking up his fingerprints on the metal buttons, even though he cleaned it after every use.

He lifted the radio-like device out of the box and closed his eyes for a moment, gripping it. Then he turned it on and began to tap out a message in Morse Code.

 **M,**

 **All is not well.**

 **Our Solider is fallen and I do not know if this time he will rise again.**

 **No news of River.**

 **– X**

It was short, but it would do. Cryptic enough that it would be at least mildly confusing for anyone intercepting it, yet detailed enough that the intended receiver should have all the information she needed. Or so he hoped, as he returned everything back to its proper place.

* * *

 **Undisclosed Location**

She read the printed message again even as it burned on the fire, the paper curling, the ink smoking lightly until there was nothing but ash.

 **Received.**

 **– M**

The reply she sent back was short and to the point. He would pick it up and know that at least she knew.

She sat back in her chair, for once in her life, uncertain.

Then she made her decision and picked up the second of her communication devices. This one was different; the likes would not be seen in human technology for several decades.

"Cesar?" she said into it.

The static fizzed through it quietly.

"Cesar, pick up. I know you can hear me."

The silence fizzled through the receiver for another few seconds.

"Cesar, I am growing impatient. Do not force me to use other lines of communication to gain your attention."

Far, far away, the one with the other handset rolled out of bed and scrambled for the communicator which he kept in the bottom drawer of his beside cabinet.

"Cesar…"

"Alright, alright - I'm listening," he interrupted. "This better be good."

They were both 'to the point' people; it was one of the many qualities they admired in eachother.

"I'm calling for a favour."

"A favour?"

"I need your specific skill set for a gravely injured person."

There was a rush of static; a sigh. No other response.

"You owe me," she said, dangerously quiet.

" _Owed_ you, you mean. I helped you heal your husband, I have searched for your lost boy, so why are you calling on me again – you know what this means."

"You haven't found him though, have you?" she accused. "And you will always owe me. I saved your life - amongst the very, very many others of your kind - and you always said one of your lives was worth three of ours. So prove it now, or admit you are just as worthless as the rest of us."

His faced flushed with frustration and suppressed anger.

"And if I don't help you?"

"Then he dies, I imagine," she said, staring into the fire once more. "He is strong, but if his father is sending me that sort of message then my potions will have very little to work on. So if you say no… he dies. I wouldn't have called you if I had another way."

"You can't call on me a third time – I'm not one of your _genies_. Your memories – I told you I wouldn't be able to convince them again if they find out…"

"So don't let them find out. Whilst I am of use to them, they will not follow through with that petty threat of theirs. Besides, I will call on you a thousand times if I have to; I do not care for my memories."

"Then you must care a lot for this man you want me to save."

"I wouldn't be talking to you if I didn't, Cesar," she said, simply.

He ground his teeth, plucking a half-smoked cigar off his table and patting around for a lighter.

"Alright I'll do it," he growled. "Where am I going to?"

"Well first, you are coming for me."

* * *

 **Apologies for the botched medical jargon and drugs. I remember doing some research about it, but to be honest it was months ago now so I'm just going to go ahead and hope past!me was thorough with that.**

 **The Russian lullaby is a genuine Russian lullaby I heard of and found a copy of online. Paste a line or two into Google if you want the full translation. And yes, Xandr sings lullabies. Of course he does. He's the actual best.**

 **Anyway. New characters coming into play. Exciting, eh?**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**

 **14/12/18**


	9. Chapter 8 - Bridge

**Thanks to: _Fowl Fox_ (congrats on the actual account now!) and _Steinbock_ , ye olde faithfuls.**

 **Eh... guess I decked it for reviews with that long, slow chapter. Oh well never mind - have another one.**

 **WARNINGS: Bit trippy. No actual violence. I don't think...**

* * *

 **CHAPTER EIGHT**

 **"BRIDGE"**

 _ **Definition: A means of getting over an otherwise impassable obstacle**_

 **Unknown** **Location**

 _When he awoke, everything was grey._

 _There was no white. Nor black. The brightest colour around was an eerie silver._

 _He blinked a few times, then sat up. There was no-one around him; he could tell. It wasn't even really a 'sense'. He just knew it._

 _He was soaking wet, though all around him was dry. Sand stuck to his skin, gritty and real on his palms as he brushed it off._

 _His shirt was as tattered with bullet holes as it had been when he had last closed his eyes, but when he pulled down his tie and unbuttoned the top, peeling back the material and unstrapping his ballistic vest with wincing anticipation, the flesh underneath it was clean and undamaged._

 _He got to his feet. Something weird was going on here and he had a looming thought of what it might be._

 _He stood and looked around and as he did, the colour started bleeding back into the world._

 _The wind picked up, scattering him with dust so violently he shielded his face and closed his eyes._

 _When it stopped, he squinted like one who had suddenly thrown back the curtains on a fresh dawn, scowling as his retinas tried to make sense of the new information._

 _A short way away, there was a tree overlooking a pond, with a stream dashing clear, white water onto a rock face._

 _He was thirsty._

 _He walked towards it, noticing suddenly that his feet were treading on disturbed ground. Something had been this way before him. No, not this way - away from the oasis ahead. And not just been. Something had been dragged._

 _He suddenly had a sinking feeling that that 'something' may have been him._

 _Had someone dragged him to where he had woken up? He didn't think so._

 _Had he crawled there himself? He didn't remember doing so._

 _He patted the front of himself to see if there was any evidence of sand scraped into his shirt; as there should be if he had belly-crawled along._

 _But instead of the ragged material of the shirt he had been wearing that night, he felt the soft, familiar feel of one of his old training t-shirts under his palms. Instead of wet as he had been moments earlier, he was dry._ _His legs were wrapped in his comfortable old gi trousers. Clothes he had worn many, many times in the manor gym. Dressed though he may have been, he felt naked without a body armour and a gun… He lamented the loss of his gear, though his hands were deadly enough weapons on their own merit and he definitely felt well enough to take on anything that might compete with him for the water source - or any'one'._

 _He reached the edge of the pond and walked the bank to the stream, grasping handfuls of the crystal liquid as it cascaded over the craggy cliff-face. Something was odd about the water, but he couldn't quite place what it was… He snatched at it, running one hand over his head and deciding a quick rinse off wouldn't be out of order either._

 _Crouching at the edge of the pond, he realised suddenly that it was very deep – the sandy bottom dropping off almost immediately from the bank and the bed of it far beyond what he could see. He reached one hand down to touch the surface lightly, sending ripples across its mirrored surface. His reflection smiled back at him._

 _Only he wasn't smiling._

 _With a saturated explosion, the mirage erupted from the water, slamming into him with such force that he had no chance of correcting his balance before he landed heavily, backside first, into the dust._

 _"Fuck!" he yelped; the hysterical cackling that was brought forth from the curse confirming his suspicions._

 _"Ah come on, Mylo!" came the mismatched accent, just like his own. "I got you with that one when we were like eight!"_

 _He swiped a hand down his face, shaking water off his shaven head and beaming at him._

 _And Myles looked up at the man – a complete and perfect reflection of himself – and gaped silently._

 _"What's the matter with you? You look like you've seen a ghost," his companion smirked, offering him a hand._

 _Myles grabbed it as though it were a lifeline and he was a castaway, almost leaping to his feet as he did so._

 _"Hey - easy, Mylie; don't pull something. Eight was a long time ago. We're old now, remember?"_

 _But Myles wasn't listening. He took one more look at his brother and then pulled him – soaked clothes and all – into a bearhug._

 _"Alright, alright…" Beckett said, but he wrapped his arms around his twin's back in return and squeezed him just as hard._

 _When they finally broke away, Myles scrubbed a hand across his face and sniffed._

 _"How've you been?" he asked, as though his brother had merely returned from an extended expedition._

 _"Better now you're here," Beckett said, scrunching his nose in a way which suggested he was keeping rather a lot back. In a way, Myles suddenly realised, that Dom did too. How that was possible, he didn't know. The boy had never so much as met his father, let alone had opportunity to pick up mannerisms from him._

 _"How did you find me? How are you here?"_

 _"Haven't a clue, lil bro," he said, shaking the water off himself like a dog. "Just saw you wandering around over there and couldn't pass up an opportunity to scare the shit outta you."_

 _That wasn't very helpful and Myles decided that 'how' exactly he was here could wait in favour of 'where'._

 _"More to the point; where are we?"_

 _"Not sure. Looks like…" Beckett gazed around. "Some sort of oasis I guess. Seems a bit nice to be purgatory... Road to Valhalla, perhaps?"_

 _He too had miraculously dried after leaving the water of the pool. They were dressed identically. He looked not quite the same as he had the day he had last seen him. He looked slightly older. He looked - though Myles didn't make much of a habit of staring at himself in the mirror - exactly like him. Just as he always had._

 _"So I take it we're dead, then?" he asked – blunt as ever._

 _"Well if we are," Beckett frowned. "That's a bit shit."_

 _"How do you mean?"_

 _"I had stuff left to do. Plans. I need to find Theresa."_

 _Myles smiled, despite himself. "You're looking for her?"_

 _"Well, is she looking for me?" Beckett asked - almost... tentatively? Myles wasn't sure what the strange tone in his brother's voice was._

 _"We all are," he told him._

 _"But you haven't found me yet?"_

 _"No, obviously."_

 _"Then you're doing a shit job," Beckett snorted._

 _"I think you might be dead," Myles admitted._

 _"And that's stopping you?"  
_

 _"Well it's put a longer timeframe on it," his brother shrugged._

 _"What makes you so sure I've kicked it then?"_

 _"Because I'm pretty sure I have – and here you are with me."_

 _"Why's that then?"_

 _"What – why do I think I'm dead? Because last thing I remember before waking up in here I was leaking claret like a mill bag and Pa was telling me not to dare die on him."_

 _"Naughty, naughty," Beckett chided, amused. "And to think; you were always the good twin. You always did as you were told."_

 _"Not always," Myles smirked. "And well, I don't think I could very much help it this time."_

 _He sighed, looking down has his hands, his arms. His scars were still there, certainly, but there were no fresh wounds. He was... fine._

 _"Mylo, why am I here?" Beckett asked, suddenly._

 _"No idea. Because it's my heaven and hell all in one to be stuck with nobody else but you for the rest of eternity, maybe?"_

 _"Cute," his brother rolled his eyes. "And also, I'd say we're even. Aaand that we could have worse deals."_

 _"Is this it then? No going back? We're dead?"_

 _"I think if we do nothing... then yes."_

 _"What do you mean?" he frowned. Beckett seemed to have only just accepted the idea of being dead and now suddenly he was coming up with all the explanations?_

 _"Well, not being funny but that pool of water isn't getting any bigger - the water is flowing up."_

 _"Shit…" Myles scowled at it – that had been what was strange about the water. How had he not noticed that before?_

 _"Aaand it's definitely shrinking," his brother said, scuffing the edge of the pond with his bare foot._

 _There was a circle of damp sand around the edge. A band, getting wider and wider as the pool began to disappear._

 _"Is that where you came from?" he asked, suddenly remembering waking up soaked to the skin and the drag marks leading to where he had been lain._

 _"The water? Yeah – you saw me, remember?"_

 _"Yes, but before that - you said thought you'd be funny and leap out of it."_

 _"I don't know. Do you remember how you got here?"_

 _Myles shook his head. "No. I woke up pisswet through and it looked like I'd dragged myself over there. So maybe... But no, I don't remember. You?"_

 _Beckett shrugged. "Anything pre-seeing you is just grey fuzz. I just remember thinking it was a good idea to do an underwater ambush. Hey, am I a figment of your imagination?"_

 _"Or am I of yours?" Myles asked quietly, as he eyed_ _the stream flowing up the rocks._

 _"You going back?" Beckett asked him._

 _"Think so, Beck," he said, crouching and tracing his fingers across the water surface. "Got shit to do, like you said. Gotta find you, for one. If you're not actually dead, that is."_

 _"Nobel mission," he nodded._

 _"Damn straight," he said, straightening up. "Worthy cause."_

 _"Definitely worth that pool potentially being the end of everything, right?"_

 _"Well," Myles said, mulling it over. "It's a metaphor for something, clearly. And I don't see an alternative if we stay here. Looks to be the only water source around, so once it's gone..."_

 _There was the trained side of him. Even here - wherever 'here' was - he was thinking ahead. He knew his brother would have done the same. If they were to survive in this new environment, water was - since his earlier thirst dictated it was still almost certainly a necessity for them - high up on the list of priorities. With this pool gone, there would be nothing to keep them in the area. They would have to follow the retreating water back up - or was that 'down'? - stream. They'd maybe find materials to build a shelter up there. Food, even. All presuming they needed such provisions, what with being dead and all. They would build something regardless. A base. A den, if you like. They would set up camp, get a fire going, run reccy missions of the area, organise themselves a routine so they never ran short of supplies, learned about the local wildlife and their habits, began to look for other residents in the area..._

 _Myles suddenly realised that this was what he was choosing between._

 _A nice, simple life with his twin brother. One they could thrive together in. One he would enjoy the challenges of._

 _Or..._

 _His real life. The one he had left behind._

 _His sense of purpose was fading. It would be so much easier to start walking after the water..._

 _"What are you going to do?" he asked Beckett._

 _"I dunno. Follow you, I guess."_

 _"Why?" he snorted. "I'm not normally the one who makes the decisions, big brother - even when I probably should."_

 _"I dunno. This feels... different. Anyway, what have I got to live for? Really, I mean. Theresa has probably moved on, I don't really have any other ties other than... well you I guess. And Pa, but I guess he'll be joining us eventually," his brother shrugged. He had pulled the 'because I'm the eldest' card at many an opportunity when they were younger - even if it was only by a matter of minutes - so to be contemplating following Myles without question now seemed... odd. "So yeah. I'm right behind you."_

 _"She hasn't, you know," said Myles. "Not really. And you have more to live for than you think."_

 _"If you say so," Beckett shrugged._

 _Myles ground his teeth, pondering over telling his brother that he had a son by the woman he loved._

 _"Stop doing that. Pa would clip you for it."_

 _The mention of their father's name brought the real world back to the forefront of his mind._

 _Pa. Dom. Theresa. Artemis._

 _He had to go back._

 _"We have to go back," he stated, almost as though to convince himself._

 _"So what then?" Beckett asked. "How do we do that?"_

 _"I don't know, this was your idea."_

 _"Was not," he snorted._

 _"Right," Myles sighed. "Well. I think we... go into the water. Since as far as we know, we came out of it. Swim down as deep as we can. I just have this... feeling that eventually we'd be swimming up and then... well I don't know..."_

 _"So we swim until maybe we drown, maybe we get out. Sounds like a plan. You go first and I'll just limber up to save your arse again when it all goes wrong, shall I?" Beckett drawled, folding his arms lazily and Myles began to think maybe all this was real after all. That was his brother alright; sardonic, reckless... and fiercely overprotective._

 _"Do you have any better ideas?" he asked, defensively._

 _Beckett raised his hands, laughing._

 _"Alright, alright - what're we thinking? A dive? A gentle slide-in?"_

 _"Jump," Myles said, certainly._

 _"Alright," Beckett shrugged, eyeing up the pool for depth._

 _"Wait," his twin said sharply._

 _"What?" he quirked his eyebrow at him. "Not chicken, are you?"_

 _Myles looked at him. He hadn't seen him in so, so long. He wasn't sure what was going to happen when he jumped into this pool, but he was fairly certain it was going to be a long, long time before he saw him again. If ever._

 _"No," he scorned, looking into the pool. "Nothing, anyway. Let's get it over with – are you with me?"_

 _But Beckett was walking away - following the water into the distance where forests and mountains awaited..._

 _Myles turned, suddenly quite scared, even, his twin was leaving him._

 _He didn't want to do this on his own._

 _He felt ten years old again on the first day of the Academy._

 _Beckett's brash, overconfident demeanour had got them through that day, but it had been Myles' calm, serious nature that had got them through the first night they had spent away from at least the vague proximity of one or both of their parents._

 _They were two halves of the same person._

 _Identical opposites._

 _"Beck?"_

 _He wasn't quite sure he wanted to do this anymore._

 _He thought about changing his mind._

 _Thought about just leaving it all behind and..._

 _"Stupid fucking question," Beckett barked a laugh, then barrelled straight into him at a run, taking away any chance for second-guessing and plunging them both into the deep, dark depths of the pool._

* * *

Myles found he couldn't breathe almost immediately – which was obvious, considering he was underwater. They fell quicker than he was expecting – as though the water had only the resistance of air. Less, even. The weight of Beckett's shoulder buried in his torso grew heavier and heavier until it was uncomfortable and then painful even and then he thrashed to tap out on his side and get him to release.

He was reaching the point where his lungs were beginning to give him signals to breathe and it was a conscious effort to override them. He couldn't feel his brother, other than the pressure on his chest he was sure was the triangular point of the other man's shoulder still in place from his rugby tackle. But he couldn't find the rest of him when he flung his arm back and forth.

"Beckett!" he tried to shout, despite being underwater. "Beck! Where are you?!"

Something was jammed between his teeth - into his mouth - and he couldn't get the words out.

He opened his eyes - which was difficult as it felt as though they had been taped shut.

But when he managed to... he was not underwater.

He was in a room with dimmed lights and monitors all around him.

A hospital.

And he was alone.

No Beckett.

Nobody.

But he still couldn't breathe.

He couldn't _breathe!_

There was something stuffed into his throat and he clawed at it desperately, sending the machines into a frenzy of frantic beeping and whining.

He wrenched the ventilator tube out of his throat and wretched, coughing and gasping.

That had been pretty high on his list of 'horrible shit to happen to me' and really it was _quite_ a list.

He heaved great, gasping breaths and as soon as his lungs had inflated properly again of their own accord, he began to shout. To shout one thing that was very, very important to his scrambled consciousness right now.

The dream - or whatever it had been - was still bright and vivid in his mind.

 _" - are you with me?"_

 _"Stupid fucking question..."_

"Beck! Beckett!" he called as loud as he could. " _Beckett!_ "

And suddenly someone burst through the door.

But it was not his brother – it was not even just the one person.

In seconds his room was filled with nurses and doctors all jabbering away at him to _'calm down'_ and to _'stay still'._ But he couldn't. He _couldn't_. He'd just seen his brother in the first time in eight years and nobody on the _planet -_ or off it, for that matter - had the authority to tell him to sit quietly after that.

And even as his consciousness grew sharper and he began to realise it might not have been reality after all, some stubborn part of him held onto the fact; clung to it against all evidence to the contrary.

"Beck," he mumbled, even as the needle went into his canula and flooded his veins with a stronger form of sedative once more. "Beckett..."

 _" - are you with me?"_

 _"Stupid fucking question..."_

* * *

 **Undisclosed Hospital, Dublin**

Dom wasn't the kind of child to hold hands. He was the kind of child who would run on ahead – albeit also obediently screech to a halt at the kerb of a sideroad. But today his small fingers were entwined with his mother's and he timed his footfalls perfectly with hers until they drew to a stop where Xandr had asked them to wait.

"You OK, sweetheart?" she murmured, giving his hand a squeeze.

He nodded. He had still not spoken more than one word since he had last seen his uncle.

"He's hooked up to some monitors and he does have a few drains sticking out of him and stuff, but don't be worried about them. They're just keeping him stable while he recovers."

Another parent might had said how the medical equipment was 'special' and 'helping', but Theresa didn't believe in sugar-coating any more than necessary. Her son was smart and from a background where 'the wires and things are making him better' would be more insulting than comforting.

"He still looks… You know. Like him," she added, squeezing his hand. He was seven after all.

The boy nodded again, his eyes distant. Ahead of them, his grandfather was talking with the nurses, ducking his large frame to listen to them speak. They seemed to be giving him news they thought he should be surprised to hear. They seemed even more surprised when he appeared not. Eventually he came back over. He seemed pleased. He was even… smiling?

"Good news," he confirmed.

"He's awake?" Theresa guessed.

"Well," he said, cocking his head slightly. "He _was_. Damn near choked on the trachea tube and tried ripping it out himself, from what they tell me. But they're pumping him full of sedation again now."

"He was already doped to the eyeballs – how much are they giving him _now?_ " she demanded. "And how exactly did he manage to wake up?"

"Butler-genes," he shrugged. "And calm, **_doch'_**. They know what they are doing."

"Sure they do. Letting a critically injured man wake up whilst on life-support…" she muttered.

"We may very well have them to thank for the fact that he's _off_ full life-support now and doing remarkably well for the state he's in," he said, leading the way to his son's hospital room. "The fact he woke up is most likely entirely his own doing."

"Well," she sniffed. "I wouldn't expect anything less."

They entered the room together, Dom just slightly behind. He was a bit beyond hiding behind his mother, but he felt like doing so just then. There was something that frightened him about seeing his invincible uncle looking so… fragile.

Xandr ushered them in and closed the door, dropping the blinds over the window. Theresa went straight to the medical records again and Dom… Dom just stood.

"You can touch him," Xandr told him. "If you want."

Dom bit his lip, stepping ever-so-slowly closer to his uncle's bedside.

The machines beeped slowly, The Major's chest rising and falling slowly.

Dom sat down on the chair Theresa had sat on when she had last been there and very gently laid his head on the sheet just next to his uncle's hand, focusing his gaze on the grazed knuckles and placing his own, _almost_ touching, just alongside.

"Tough bastard, isn't he?" Theresa said, shaking her head in disbelief.

"He's from good stock," Xandr smirked, reclaiming his previously used chair and checking the chemicals dripping slowly into his son's bloodstream. "Of course, it probably helped I closed the valve a little on his sedative drip last night…"

"Pa!" Theresa exclaimed. "Why?!"

"Well, I say 'closed' – I just slowed the flow enough that if he was able to wake up of his own accord, he should be able to."

Theresa flashed her eyes at him over both of their prone sons and he shrugged.

 _That was dangerous!_ she accused him with her glare.

 _It was necessary,_ he blinked back, nonchalantly.

"Did the nurses say anything else?" she said instead.

"He's looking at another month or two in intensive care, then presuming that goes well, he can be transferred to a specialist recovery unit."

"Gimme a week," a voice rasped.

"Uncle!" Dom yelped, flying upright.

Theresa jumped in alarm too, for it had been the first word out of the boy's mouth in almost two days.

"Hey, kiddo," he murmured.

The boy barely refrained from leaping onto the bed as he flung his arms across the man's chest. The Major held back a nauseating wince, gritting his teeth.

"Easy," he panted. "Easy, now,"

Dom froze, pulling away carefully, but not letting go of his arm.

"How do you feel, sirrah?" Xandr asked him, eyeing him carefully.

"Like shit," his son mumbled.

"Obviously," he snorted. "Specifics?"

"Everything it says on these sheets, I'd imagine," Theresa said curtly.

For a moment she held her composure, then he gave her a weak smile – a guilty, apologetic, grin; begging her forgiveness for putting her through this ordeal – and she broke.

"You stupid, _stupid_ motherfu…" she began, pressing her fist to her mouth to stop her voice from cracking.

"Ah, 'Resa," he coughed slightly. " _Children_."

She threw the clipboard back into its housing and grabbed hold of his hand over Dom's, slinging her other arm around her son and squeezing him close. Myles lifted his free arm over her and tried to squeeze back, but the effort it took was gargantuan and the absence of his usual invincible strength made the gesture more frightening than comforting.

"Don't you _ever_ scare us like that again," she murmured, pressing her forehead to his for the barest moment, giving a giant sniff before pulling away. " _Ever_ , you hear me?"

Myles shook his head slowly, his arm dropping back a little too heavily onto the bed.

"It's OK. I don't reckon I'll get chance."

There was a small silence that Xandr filled with a sigh.

"Well let's just worry about getting you back on your feet, first," he said. "A week, you say?"

"Maybe two," Myles grimaced. "Three if I take the piss. May as well milk this, right? Only chance of a holiday I'm going to get with Artemis as a charge."

Xandr barked a laugh, placing a large hand on his son's head and running a thumb over his brow.

"I expect you back in the manor by New Year, **_syn,_** " he said.

"I'll work on that timeframe, then," Myles sighed. "How are the charges?"

"Fine," his father told him. "All fit and healthy - thanks to you. And Dom, of course."

The Major's nephew didn't smile and he realised his last memory of the boy on that country lane that night had been his bloodstained face and frightened eyes, begging him not to die, bravely putting himself between him and an approaching unknown... He squeezed his hand gently.

"Of course. He's a good lad," he said. Then a thought struck him suddenly. "How's B... how's the car? What happened to... it?"

"She's been towed back to the manor," Alexandr told him. "I put her in one of the garages under a cover. I was going to start seeing if the damage was worth repairing, but I thought you'd want to do that. Once you're up and a about again, I mean."

Myles nodded, smiling slightly.

He'd like that.

The door opened without warning and they all jumped, Xandr surreptitiously sliding his handgun back into its holster and standing when he saw who it was.

"Hello Matron," he rumbled. "I was just coming to speak to you."

"As you should – he should not be awake," she said, bustling into the room and checking the various machines and drip bags.

"I find it encouraging that he is," Xandr said simply.

"Yes, well – as _encouraging_ as it is, your son needs his rest, Mr Kendrew," said the nurse, sternly. "I'm going to have to ask you all to leave."

Theresa made to protest and Xandr stopped her with a placating hand.

"That's quite alright," he said, turning to his son. "We'll see you tomorrow, Coyle."

Myles almost smiled at the alias his father had chosen for them and reluctantly let go of Theresa's hand as she stood. Reluctantly. That spoke volumes in itself. Dom gave a small whimper and gripped his arm like a limpet.

His uncle reached across to touch him on the cheek.

"I'll give you a minute to say goodnight," the nurse said, closing the door behind her. She was not a bad person, but her patient's health was her priority, as emotionally charged as the intensive care environment could be.

"Go on," Myles said, patting his nephew gently. "Go home now. Tim needs someone to watch out for him whilst I'm out of action, alright?"

Dom looked at him somewhat sulkily, but let go of his arm.

"Good boy. And no hare-brained schemes whilst I'm gone, you understand."

That made the Butler boy smile a little; both of them knowing that was entirely _not_ up to him.

"We'll be back," Theresa promised, pulling Dom away gently. "Don't do anything _else_ stupid whilst we're gone."

"I'll be waiting right here," he replied. "Unless…"

"Unless what, Myles?" she frowned.

"Unless someone hatches an elaborate plan to get me out of here."

"See you tomorrow, idiot," she said, shaking her head.

Myles watched them go, saying nothing about the moment he had opened his eyes and, just for a moment, been convinced he had been looking at a younger version of his brother at his bedside.

* * *

 **Well, I hope you enjoyed that little snippet of Beckett Butler there. Him and Myles really bump off eachother, which is fun to write.**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**

 **18/12/18**


	10. Chapter 9 - Negotiations

**Thanks to: _ghost235, Jolinnn, Spencerblue, 6000j, Steinbock, Fowl Fox_ and _2whitie_ \- there you all are, you awesome people you.**

 **WARNINGS: Possible trigger warning for very dark thoughts from Myles re: survival and lack of motivation to. Also, discussion of medical injuries researched purely by talking to and googling people with similar conditions. Also, a chapter without Dom appearing in it. Shocking.**

* * *

 **CHAPTER 9**

 **"NEGOTIATIONS'**

 **Definition: A discussion aimed at reaching an agreement**

 **Undisclosed Hospital, Dublin**

She did see him the next day. And the next. On the third day, however, Myles underwent his second bout of surgery and it was firmly demanded that his number of visitors was cut to just one.

"He will most likely be asleep anyway," they assured them.

His family doubted it...

 ** _"Khoroshiy vecherniy, syn,"_** he greeted him, as he entered the room.

Myles opened his eyes. He was guiltily relieved to see his father was alone. The surgery had taken more out of him than he cared to admit and he did not want Theresa and Dom to see him so… feeble.

"Is it?" he muttered, grumpily.

"How do you feel?" his father asked, in English now.

"Stoned," he said, his eyes rolling closed.

"And what would you know of that, eh?" he chuckled, sitting down on the chair and dragging it up to the bed.

His son made as though to sit up and look at him, but only made it a few degrees before he made a pained, gargling, groaning noise and lay back down.

"I don't know how much more of this I can take, Pa," he admitted quietly.

"The surgery will help in the long run, My-boy. Other than that, time will tell."

"Time," Myles scoffed.

"Time," Alexandr repeated, evenly.

The younger bodyguard gave a huff and then fell silent.

"I'm dying, aren't I?" he said, eventually, the words filling the room.

His father said nothing, but he let out a great sigh, air rushing from the very depths of his chest.

"I keep having... dreams," Myles continued. "They feel like visions."

"Thaaat," Xandr stretched the word with a knowing nod. "Will be the drugs, my boy."

"I keep... Thinking I've seen Beckett," Myles admitted quietly.

"Well, unless he's managed to sneak in here whilst we've been gone, I would also put that down to the drugs," the older man noted.

"I... I'm not coming back from this, am I, Pa?"

Again his father said nothing.

"It's OK. You can say it. I know. I can _feel_ it."

Alexandr folded his hands together under his chin and looked at him.

"I think it's really a case of surviving until the next operation for now, seeing how you recover and then…"

"I can _feel_ it," Myles murmured again, closing his eyes. "I go to sit up, I go to move, reach for something and there's just… nothing."

"That's just weakness, son. It'll pass."

"Yeah," the man in the hospital bed grunted. "Or I'll die."

"Well, aren't you of a sensationally sunny disposition this evening," Xandr drawled.

"I feel like shit. What do you expect?"

"I expect you to buck yourself up and focus on your recovery," said his father, raising an eyebrow. "Self-pity doesn't suit you, boy."

Myles lolled his head back and stared at the ceiling.

"Sorry. I'm just not enjoying feeling so… helpless."

"Perhaps you just feel normal," Xandr mused.

" _Normal?_ " Myles snorted in disgust.

"Yes. _Normal_. Like all the other mere mortals of the world."

"You've been shot in the head, what, twice now?" his son scorned. "What would you know about being _mortal_?"

"True," Xandr smirked.

Myles smiled too, momentarily.

"Pa… You know what I… ah… you know what I want to happen if I don't… Ah fuck it – " he snapped eventually. " – if I die, you know where my will is. Shortly put; Theresa and Dom get everything. Alright?"

"I thought that might be the case," Alexandr said, with a soft smile.

"No offence. I was hoping to outlive you," he told him with a shrug. "You can have all my armoury, by all means."

"Myles, I _issued_ you most of your armoury."

"Not all of it," he muttered, almost sulking.

"I'll look after them, Myles. You know I will."

"Good. Wouldn't want everything rusting away unused. Give the Sig to Dom, when he's big enough. He's got a thing about them, fuck knows why when there's a perfectly good Glock that suits him better at the momen…"

"Myles. I wasn't talking about the guns."

Myles closed his eyes.

"I know."

* * *

The next day when visiting time rolled around, he was sleeping.

When he awoke, he knew instantly he wasn't alone.

He inhaled slowly, so as not to arise suspicion, keeping his eyelids closed.

"Stop sniffing the air, weirdo. It's me."

"Ah good," he croaked. "I was so hoping for a sympathetic visitor."

"Yeah, well – keep dreaming, dipshit."

He scowled, but inside his bandaged chest, his battered heart lifted slightly.

"And I'm not here to give you a bed bath, either. In case you were getting hopeful."

He snorted. "Good. Having a nurse try that was bad enough, thank-you very much."

Theresa shuddered and made a noise in the back of her throat.

"Oh I am sorry," he snarked. "What _exactly_ is so repulsive about that?"

" _You_ ," she scoffed. "And your drains sticking out all over the place. _Gross_. And there's so _much_ of you. Must have been like bathing a baby rhino. Poor nurse. I don't know how they do it."

"You pretty much _are_ a nurse!"

"Yeah, I know. Doesn't mean I _like_ dealing with bodily fluids."

He shook his head, not quite sure if she was serious or not.

"Is it too much to ask for a drink, _nurse_?"

"So needy," she scoffed, reaching for the plastic jug on the side anyway and pouring him a cup of water.

He raised it to her in a mock toast.

"Here's to the future - or what's left of it."

"Oh good jaysus," she rolled her eyes. "Pa said you were bad, but I thought you were just hamming it up to skive another week off work."

Myles downed the water and said nothing.

"Give over with your Tiny Tim act. You're not actively dying. If the _actual_ nurses let me, I'd have you up and about in a few more days - give you something new to complain about."

"What, on a zimmer frame? Great. I'll look forward to that then," he muttered, darkly.

"Baby steps, Myles. Baby steps. Let's tackle sitting up properly in bed first, shall we?"

"Don't see the point. May as well get practice lying down. Horizontal coffins are traditional, are they not?"

Theresa pinched the bridge of her nose. She had come in today with every intention on beating the blues out of her friend, but if he carried on like he was, the only beating she'd be doing would be around his bloody head...

"What meds are you on today, sunshine?"

"Fuck knows," he muttered, lolling back on the thin hospital cushions. "Too many."

"Or not enough. How are you feeling?"

"Oh fabulous, thank-you for asking. Really good. Can't remember the last time I was so cheerful."

Theresa gave him a 'look'.

" mean how are you feeling on the meds, you sarcastic prick. Side effects and so on. You're on insane doses…"

He decided against telling her of his visions of his brother.

"I dunno. What exactly should I be looking out for?"

Theresa lifted the increasingly thickening folder from the end of the bed and flicked through the pages, beginning to read aloud.

"Bla, bla, bla… more method of admintering shit... Ah, here we go," she cleared her throat. "The medications you have been prescribed may cause nausea, dizziness, breathing difficulties, hallucinations, depression…"

"Tick, tick, tick. Jesus Christ…" he muttered under his breath. "Just skip to the part where it says 'sudden death', would you?"

Theresa raised an eyebrow at him, but decided to cut him some slack, replacing the file with a barely-restrained sigh of annoyance. There was a broody silence for a while, whilst she weighed up whether it was worth even beginning a conversation with him this evening.

"She left me with the bowl of water in the end. Let me try it myself," he said, making the effort. "If you were wondering. The nurse, I mean."

"I was determinedly trying _not_ to wonder, actually," she snarked, sitting down on the chair next to his bed.

"Damn near killed me; lifting my arms," he elaborated.

"Ah, that'll be where the scent of medication-permeated sweat is coming from then," she quirked her mouth at him.

"If you can't appreciated my 'manly stench' odour, then that's your problem. It was a conscious decision not to scrub my armpits properly, I'll have you know," he argued.

"Wussed out?" she accused.

"Wussed out," he admitted.

"Want me to go ask for a flannel or something?" she asked, serious now. "I was kidding about your drains freaking me out. I don't mind."

"Good _God_ no," he snorted. "Do you _want_ me to die of embarrassment before all these internal injuries carry me off?"

"I don't want you to die at all, to be honest."

He sighed. He had been trying to avoid that line of conversation, and what with all the talk of awkwardness and bed baths, he thought he'd been doing a pretty good job. But there it was. The elephant in the room. _Him_.

"I wasn't keen on the idea, either, _to be honest_..." he mimicked.

She stood suddenly and for a moment he thought she was going to leave before either of them got too emotional about the concept.

But instead she bounced down on the edge of the bed, swinging her legs up alongside his.

"Ah, ah, ah, _oww_ ," he hissed. "Shit, 'Resa – I _just_ said…"

"Oh shut up, you big wimp," she grumbled, pushing at him gently. "And move your arse, you fat shit. Jesus, how do you people take up so much _room_..."

"If by 'you people' you mean Butlers," he winced. "May I just point out that it was by your own volition you started hanging around with this family and by now you should be well-versed in our short-comings. Or tall-comings. Whichever."

She snorted. "You know full well I had no choice in the matter from the moment I set eyes on your brother. You spend so much time looking after everybody else you forget to look after yourself. And that's my job. I'm a looker-afterer. You Butlers are like a beacon for that shit. Now shift."

He wriggled most undignifiedly over to make room, his breathing ratcheting up a notch, the heart-rate monitor a metre away giving a louder, double beep.

"You know this is against health and safety rules, right?" he said, through gritted teeth.

She wanted to curl in under his arm, but he held it clamped to his side and since for once it wouldn't take a Butler-expert to read the fact he was in pain, she didn't push it. Instead, she hooked hers over the top of the pillow shuffled up the bed so that she was looking down at him. He scowled up at her. He hadn't been able to shave since he was put in here. His head and jaw were covered in short, raspy hairs. She smiled at him.

"What exactly do you think you are doing?" he grumbled.

"It's my turn," she said.

He thought about it. The last time they had been sharing a bed like this, it had been him holding her life together by the threads. And now here they were, what, a fortnight later? Time flies when you're having fun...

Or something like that.

"So in most _normal_ people's terms," she continued. "I suppose it would be described as 'comforting you'."

"Oh God, I really am dying, aren't I?" he drawled.

"Shut up, idiot," she muttered, flopping her hand onto his face and smoothing his frown out with her fingers.

"How's Dom?" he asked, by way of a change of subject, as she began to gently stroke his forehead, sliding her palm over his bristly skull, lightly.

He would reach up and push her hand away, if it wouldn't hurt so much.

Or so he told himself.

"Physically? Fine."

"Has he spoken yet?"

Yesterday, his father had given him a full update on the boy.

"Nope."

"He will."

"So Pa keeps saying, but… He's only said my and your name since that night. What if…"

"What if he never speaks again? I don't think you need to worry about that. He'll come around."

"If you come home, he will."

He sighed.

"The fact nobody will discuss with me frankly my chances and options isn't giving me much hope of that, if I'm perfectly honest."

She said nothing, her fingertips lightening and swirling over his scalp. It was strange to see his hair was growing in. Beckett used to do that sometimes; let his hair grow. She would call him a scruff, but secretly she liked it. When he inevitably got bored of it – or had enough spare cash to buy a razor – she would always feel slightly sad when he was clean shaven again and promise herself she would tell him next time he left it long enough.

"How bad is it, 'Resa?" the twin of the man she loved so dearly, asked her.

She sniffed loudly. She loved him, too. Not in the same way, but just as much.

"You got yourself shot seven times, Mylo. It ain't gonna be great news."

"Tell me," he said; a request, not a demand. "Please?"

"Well a lot of your organs are fucked. You're lucky you had two kidneys to begin with. We're waiting on liver function results to see how that is. You've got a hole in your thigh you could stick your thumb in, so god knows how that didn't hit your femoral artery…"

"Yeah, I noticed that," he said, blandly.

"… you have 45% lung function – in total, not each."

"Noticed that, too."

"Your ribs aren't looking great and one of your collarbones is shattered, so you've got bone fragments floating about all over the place – not to mention the amount of shrapnel that's in you. One bullet in particular is causing a real issue because they're not sure you're fit enough for surgery to remove all of them but they want to prioritise that one because of where it is."

"That's why my legs are fucked, I take it?"

He had noticed; of course he had. He hadn't sat still in this bed for this long without at least _trying_ to get up.

"It's damaged of some nerve in your spinal column with a fancy name."

"What kind of 'damage'?" he asked, holding back an irk of irritation. "I'm sick of people pussyfooting around telling me how bad it is. Just tell me straight."

"No-one's really sure, to be honest," she said with a small grimace. "There's that much going on with you that…"

"Bullshit," he said, bluntly. " _Bullshit_. You're my friend, right? My _best_ friend, so you tell me. If I'm going to hear it from anyone, it may as well be you. How bad is it?"

"It's all healable," she said evasively.

He didn't speak. He just glared at her – up at her, which was unsettling enough as it was – daring her to inflict him the worst disrespect and _lie_ to him.

She looked away, unable to face him when she delivered the news she knew he already suspected and was desperate not to hear.

"The issue is the compression of the nerve. There's a specialist coming to have a look at your scans tomorrow."

He made no response to that, either.

"What else do you want to know?"

"Just be brutally honest with me," he said emotionlessly. "Please. And don't make me ask you again."

"Fine," she swallowed. "Being brutally honest with you, they're only giving you a 10% chance of being able to walk normally, but considering you just won out probably a 0.1% chance of surviving all this shit, I'm not going to rely on statistics."

"I can't work though, right?" he said, numbly, staring at the ceiling.

"You should be able to walk…"

"I said _work_ ," he cut her off, shortly.

"I know what you said. But you should be able to _walk_ again a few months."

"A few months. Great."

"These things take time, Mylo…"

"Jesus Christ!" he snapped suddenly, summoning the energy to swipe her hand away this time. "I swear to god if I hear one more person telling to be _patient_ and fucking _grateful_ I survived this shit I'm going to rip all these fucking wires out of me and jump out the nearest window!"

"Don't say that," she said, her throat closing up on her. "Please don't say that."

"Stop worrying," he said sharply. "I can't get out of this fucking bed. I already tried. And all the fucking jugs and cutlery in here are made of shitty plastic, so don't go worrying about that either."

"Myles, stop it," she said, a little firmly.

"Don't _Myles_ me," he muttered bitterly. "If I was an animal they would have put me out of my misery by now. An _animal_ wouldn't have to go through this, so why are you all forcing me to?"

"Nobody's _forcing_ you to do anything," she argued. "And you're not an animal, so just..."

"'Resa I'm an upright guard dog with a gun and a driving license," he said, scowling at the nearest machine as it registered his annoyance in rapid beeps. "It's all I was ever trained for, it's all I've ever _been_. I don't _know_ how to be anything else."

"You do a pretty good job at being an uncle."

"I'm just teaching Dom to be like me. Some days I don't think that's a good thing. Today for example. And yesterday. And a few days before that when I was getting shot to shit for a paycheck."

"Right well one; I'm not sure it's a good thing either, but two; he thinks its the whole world and everything in it, so don't you dare tell him you're giving up on him now. And three; you didn't put yourself in front of bullets for money, you did it for Dom. And Artemis and Sophia. Kids. You saved their lives, Mylo. And Bates. You need to give yourself some bloody credit for that at some point. They're alive and safe, because of you. And yes, this is a shitty reward for that, but really? They're _safe_. They're _alive_ , Myles. Not even a scratch. Because of what _you_ sacrificed. And if that doesn't go some way to being worth it, then I don't know what else to say to you."

He stayed silent, but she knew she had hit onto something.

"It's completely normal to feel like crap right now," she continued resolutely. "You're in pain. You're on a lot of drugs. The fact you're even alive is a bloody miracle in itself..."

"Well someone else can have this fucking 'miracle', because _I don't want it!_ " he said, too loudly for the small room.

She took a breath to speak, but stopped, exhaling loudly instead.

"I don't know what to say to make you feel better," she said, after a moment.

"Well that makes two of us," he said, shortly. And then; "I'm sorry. You didn't need to hear that. I'll try harder to put up a front from now on."

"Don't," she frowned. "Don't be sorry. And _don't_ put up a front for me. You won't do it well enough and I'll just get pissed off with you. You tell me shit you need to get off your chest. That's what I'm for, alright?"

"I'm a Butler. We don't _do_ talking."

"I know. You think I don't know that by now?"

She sat up to look at him, but he looked away, gaze boring into the whitewashed wall opposite.

"You live your whole life," he murmured. "Being told - _expecting_ \- you'll die in the line of duty. I was okay with that."

She let him speak.

"But here I am. Still living. I didn't expect that. And I'm not… I'm not okay with it."

"Oh Mylo…" she whispered, lolling her head over until their skulls knocked together.

Her hair tickled his face and he closed his eyes tightly.

It was true. Thoughtlessly, _bizarrely_ , he had never really considered 'the inbetween'. Injuries were a given, of course, but he had always subconsciously expected that if he came up against a situation where he came out of the other side of it this badly damaged, then that would be it. There would be no recovery. They'd put him in the ground. End of story. End of duty.

What the _hell_ was he supposed to do with himself if he couldn't work? He was institutionalised to the highest degree, he knew that; he'd readily admit it. His whole life had had one purpose and if he couldn't fulfil it… then what?

"You're going to get through this," Theresa said, her voice pulling him back from his spiralling thoughts. " _We're_ going to get through this."

"Yeah? What if I don't want to."

"Then tough shit," she said, firmly, planting a kiss on his temple and swinging off the bed with far too much vigour for his battered body's liking. "Suck it up, buttercup, because I already lost one Butler twin and I sure as shit ain't going to lose another one if I can help it."

He held back a wince of pain as the mattress bounced unsympathetically. "Where are you going?"

"To get a bloody bed bath. You might not mind your armpits stinking, but I do," she told him. "And _then_ I'm going to teach you how to use the bed controls so you can stop mincing about trying to sit up."

She shot him a grin from the door and vanished.

"'Resa!" he called after her, exasperatedly.

But there was no negotiating with that woman. Not on any count.

* * *

 **Undisclosed Location, Underground**

"You took your time."

"I had to get clearance. Have you any idea how difficult that was? What was I supposed to say? Oh sorry, just got to go help an old friend and by the way, I might have forgotten to mention she's a d'arvitting _mudwoman_?"

"Don't be so ridiculous. I expected you to come up with something more imaginative than that."

"Like what?" he scoffed.

"Like the truth, perhaps?"

He grunted, piloting the shuttle expertly through the underground crevasses. He was calling in a _lot_ of favours for this. Sure, he owed the mudwitch his life and that of a great, _great_ many others. Without her, the death toll would have been higher than the 25% quoted by the Underground Medical Society. Atlantis would have been wiped out entirely, for certain.

But they had another story now. And those that knew the truth had begun to _conveniently_ forget her involvement. They had handed over credit for finding the cure to someone who was one of The People. He had not been at all happy about that, but his sense of justice didn't matter in the end.

Spelltropy was gone.

A vaccination for the disease was well on the way to finalisation, to ensure it never returned again.

They'd even started releasing the lemurs which had been captured as brain-fluid donor animals, back into the wild.

It would be so much easier to wipe her and send her on her way.

Let her forget the part she had played in the salvation of their species.

But none of them quite trusted her not to have some trick or other up her sleeve.

She was a formidable ally.

She would be an even more formidable foe.

"Do they still think that girl - Koby, or whatever her name was - found the cure?"

She had seen him thinking, of course. He was almost sure she had read his very thoughts.

"Koboi. Yes. That's the story the press released, anyway."

"Who knows different?"

"Me. A few of the others who were involved in the research program. Nobody else. It's so classified that the files have been put on lockdown for the next five centuries at least. By which time..."

"I'll be long gone, as will the disease," she finished. "And nobody will ever have to admit asking for help from a human."

"It hasn't been easy. Koboi tried to charge for the antidote."

"I told you the truth would have been the better option."

"You have no idea what kind of chaos that would have caused."

"Chaos more than losing a quarter of your number to a disease I provided a cure for?"

The elf sighed through his nose.

"You should have given it to that pony boy, instead."

"He isn't medical enough. Doesn't have enough money backing him either. Sure, he's putting forward designs for new fancy cameras and wingsuits, but he's a techy. He'll burnout like the rest of them soon enough. Koboi's family is an industry. It had to look more legit than; 'college colt finds miracle cure in monkey head'."

"It was a lemur. And I think you're wrong about him. That Foaly is a smart lad. He'll go far."

"If you say so," he muttered, exasperatedly.

There was no negotiating with the mudwoman. Not on any count.

"Where are we headed?" he asked, to change the subject.

"Ireland - close to Dublin, if you can," she told him.

He calculated mentally.

"There's a disused port near Tara. They closed it after they opened the new one. It was too small for the numbers wanting to perform the ritual, but it still functions as far as I know. We can go through there. We won't be seen."

They flew on and she stared out of the windscreen. She would never truly get used to being underground.

"How's Raine?" she asked, eventually.

"Fine," he said, too bluntly to avoid her attention.

"Honestly, Julius. Anyone would think you were fond of her."

And although his ears burned red, he said nothing.

* * *

 **OK, so I've possibly bent a few timings and things from The Time Paradox here, but screw it it's a good story. Also Foaly would only be repeating the story he was fed, so his dates and information may be out. Also, if it bothers you that much then don't worry, I don't really mention it again either and we all know I don't really write about the fairies, so don't expect much more. This fic just needed some backstory. So here we are.**

 **In terms of how Myles has been feeling and acting in this chapter, it was a difficult one to write. I've done some research in the area, but getting it to sound right is hard. For the physical side, I elaborated on a friend of mine who has a weakness of the legs caused by partial paralysis - he can still stand up, step along holding things and even climb chairs, but he uses a manual wheelchair fulltime - so I have based one of Myles' injuries on that. Hopefully everything has been semi-realistic so far and nobody has been offended by my writing.**

 **Off out into the hills for a weekend, hopefully the next update will be when I get back.**

 **Still a fair few chapters to go, so looks like this will run nicely into next year!**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**

 **22/12/18**


	11. Chapter 10 - Unresigned

**Thanks to: _Jolinnn_ and _Spencerblue_ for your reviews. Tough chapter, I know, so thanks for letting me know what you thought of it.**

 **Well, it's the very early hours (minutes, even) of Christmas Eve here, so have an early present on me. Except if you're from Germany and any other country I have not yet been informed opens their presents today... In which case, have this on time haha**

 **WARNINGS: Back to the gruff!fluff**

* * *

 **CHAPTER ELEVEN**

 **"UNRESIGNED"**

 **Definition: the opposite of 'resigned', not giving in**

 **Fowl Manor, Dublin**

"Junior?"

There was no response, but he hadn't been expecting one.

"Your grandfather won't be pleased with you if you put a dent in the plaster doing that," he tried. "Although I have to say, your repeated accuracy is quite remarkable."

The younger boy continued to bounce the ball off the floor, onto the opposite wall and back into his hand as though it was drawn there by a magnet.

 _Thud, thud, smack. Thud, thud, smack. Thud, thud, smack._

"Of course, I wouldn't expect any less of you," he said, hitching his trousers up slightly from above the knee and sliding down the wall of the corridor next to his friend.

 _Thud, thud, smack. Thud, thud, smack. Thud, thud, smack._

Still, the young Butler said nothing. Artemis sighed.

"I hear your uncle is awake. That's good news, is it not?"

 _Thud, thud, smack. Thud, thud, smack. Thud, thud, smack._

"Father won't allow me to visit yet. Says I have to give your family some privacy," continued the Fowl boy. "I don't see why. I was as close to The Major as anybody. _Am_ , I mean."

 _Thud, thud, smack. Thud, thud, smack. Thud, thud, smack._

"Junior? It really is rather hard to hold a conversation when the other party doesn't contribute, you know?" he said, trying to catch the boy's dark eyes as they bored a hole in the wallpaper more effectively than any tennis ball ever would. "Your uncle always said…"

 _Thud, thud…_

Somehow he missed the ball. Artemis flinched away as it bounced off the wall they were leaning on and escaped, rolling along the carpet and down the corridor.

The bodyguard-in-training rose silently and went after it.

He didn't come back.

* * *

 **Christmas Day - Fowl Manor, Dublin**

It was a privilege to be sat at the table with the Fowls. He knew that. His grandfather had told him, for one. Not that he had needed to; Dom had never been invited to sit with the family before and he doubted he ever would be again. But it was under exceptional circumstances. Exceptionally _bad_ , that was.

They had already done the traditional walk to Orion's fountain on the far side of the manor grounds that morning. Dom had gone, along with his grandfather, but Theresa felt as though she would be intruding. Apart from that, the little boy's untimely death in infancy, was the only reason she had ever even had the opportunity to meet the man who had been intended to be his lifelong bodyguard. Without the loss of Artemis's twin, she would have never met Beckett. There would be no Domovoi. And no one would ever have known there even could have been. She felt as though mourning the Fowl boy would be mourning all of that. It didn't feel right for her to grieve for someone when in reality she owed him only the utmost of gratitude.

The Simmons family had decided to accept the Fowl's offer to stay for the festive period. It was not for the jovial atmosphere, though Vivienne Fowl tried her best to keep the company upbeat and it was she who had insisted that Butler, to the best of his ability whilst he still remained on duty, join them for Christmas dinner, cordially extending that invitation to Theresa and Junior as well.

And so, after exchanging their own Christmas gifts in a mutedely grateful manner, they had joined the Fowls and the Simmons at the great, long table in the dining hall.

Dom was still determinedly trying not to notice the way his eyes felt hot and prickly at the thought of the gun holster he had unwrapped. It had been from his uncle, of course. His mother had rolled her eyes and said she had hoped he had been joking when he'd told her what he had got him for Christmas. His grandfather had snorted in amusement and simply told her it would come in useful. Theresa had sighed and ruffled her son's hair, but the comment hadn't sat easy with her at all. She was far too aware that one day her little boy could be lying in a hospital bed in the same condition as his uncle. And that was only if he was 'lucky'...

But for now, Dom was sat on a straight-backed chair next to his uncle's charge and he found it didn't suit him to be sat amongst the upper class. Although to be fair on the rich boy, Artemis did try his very best to make him feel at ease. Sophia hadn't been much fun to be around either since that fateful night at the theatre, though at least she was speaking. It had in the end been her and her mother's unease at returning to their own home with much less than a full company of security that had convinced Mr Simmons to stay with his business partner. Although they were assured the main threat was neutralised, there was still the question of who had hired the group which The Major had almost single-handedly managed to decimate… So far, that had been left unanswered.

"The best bit is next," Artemis whispered, once the turkey and all the trimmings had been cleared away and new plates set out at the table. "Father lights the Christmas pudding and then Mother cuts it…"

Dom nodded. Artemis was telling Sophia, mainly; he already knew how the pudding serving worked, after all. He'd been a part of making it. It was a fact not known to the Fowls, but the eldest Butler of the manor took charge of making the Christmas pudding – not the manor's baker-in-chief. The process started way back in November – or early December, whichever Sunday was closest to St Andrew's Day. The mix would be made and everyone in the household – servants and masters alike – would take turns to stir the bowl three times whilst making three wishes. The theory was, that for one of them, one of them would come true.

"… and then," Artemis continued. "Whoever gets the silver piece, gets a to make an extra Christmas wish."

Dom would perhaps have asked what happened if the knife hit the silver piece, but he didn't feel like talking. He knew about the cake and the wish. He didn't much care. He only had one wish and it wasn't going to come true.

"You OK, honey?" his mother, who was sat just next to him, asked quietly.

He nodded. Though he wasn't. He didn't want to be sat at this silly table with the stupid fire-hazard candles and lacy doilies. He wanted to be in his room. No, not in his room; the gym. Or the gun room. Or cleaning his boots in the kit bunker. He wanted to be doing something – anything – to distract him from the fact there wasn't enough places set at the table and a very large hole had been torn in his family. He wanted to ask when they would be visiting his uncle. But he didn't ask. He didn't say anything at all.

There was much polite cheering from the adults when Eugene Fowl lit the brandy-coating of the enormous Christmas Pudding and even Sophia gave a gasp of awe and smiled and clapped with the others. Dom stayed sullenly silent. It was only a pudding on fire, after all. In another circumstance it would be a cause for much swearing and drama. Instead he watched his grandfather, who was eyeing the potential baked-goods-inferno carnage with his usual, serene vigilance.

As Artemis had predicted, once the alcohol had burned off, Mrs Fowl took a large knife and carved the pudding into several pieces. There was still some left, which of course meant there was no guarantee of anyone getting the pudding charm. Regardless, she repeatedly warned everyone to cut into their slice carefully before eating any and Dom watched as his grandfather seemed less than relaxed until his charges had each announced they had not found the silver token. Impromptu Heimlich manoeuvres could rather put a downer on Christmas Dinners, after all.

Theresa squashed her fork down on her piece. She wasn't much of a fan of Christmas Pudding, if she was honest, but seen as though Pa had made it, she thought she best at least try the dessert.

"Nope, me neither!" she said.

"Nor I," Sophia echoed.

"What a shame," Eugene said, holding the plate with the rest of the cake aloft. "Perhaps it's still in the rest of the pudding..."

He put it down rather swiftly when upon tilting it towards the light, he tipped some excess brandy onto the previously pristine tablecloth...

Everyone began to tuck into their pudding, exclaiming with great appreciation how good it tasted.

Dom scraped his fork along the dark, crumbling mixture and something just below the surface glinted in the candle light. He raised his eyebrows slightly in surprise and his grandfather, noticing as always, smiled across the table at him.

"Hold it up, lad – let's see what you got."

Dom did as he was told, picking out the silver wishbone charm and holding it out on his palm.

"Oh wonderful!" Vivienne said brightly. "Everyone - look! Junior found the pudding charm!"

"What is it?" Artemis – who had memorised most of the more common pudding charms over the years.

Dom showed him, handing it over for the Fowl boy to spin in his fingers and analyse.

"Oh it's a wishbone! An obvious, if useful pudding charm. I was hoping it would be a more obscure one so that I could…"

"Give it back to him now, Artemis," Eugene said, gesturing. "He has to make his wish. A wishbone is twice as lucky, Junior."

Artemis seemed a little embarrassed at being chastised at the dinner table, but he handed it back. Dom wanted to say he could have it if he wanted it. That he didn't believe in wishes anyway. But he took it back all the same.

"Make a wish, young man," Eugene said, and had he been a less demure man, he may have rolled his hand to chivvy him.

"You could tell us, if you like," Vivienne said, with an encouraging smile. "Use your voice!"

Dom kept his mouth shut and Theresa gently shook her head. She knew the other mother was trying to help, but if Dom was going to speak at all, it would not be in front of a table of people, nor sharing something as private as a wish. Not that it was overly difficult to guess what he would wish for.

He closed his eyes, squeezing the pudding charm so hard it left indentations in his skin.

There was only one thing the young Butler boy wanted this Christmas.

* * *

 **Undisclosed Hospital, Dublin**

As much as Artemis wanted to see his bodyguard, he had no doubt the Butler family were merely being polite when they said they didn't mind the Fowls coming along. The Simmons then jumping on the bandwagon – so to speak, in actuality they were taking two cars – to come and pay a visit to Bates.

"His family have been made aware of the situation, but they aren't able to come over to visit him. I feel it would be quite unfair of us not to at least make sure he's not alone at Christmas," Thomas Simmons explained.

There had been talk of sending Bates home in time for Christmas, but the hospital staff had eventually decided he was not quite fit enough for the journey back to Scotland. There had been no such talk of sending The Major anywhere. Except down for another surgery – and even those were delayed given the time of year and the bodyguard's condition.

The nurses – already understaffed and overworked due to the day – did not seem best pleased when a total of ten people; the Butlers, the Fowls, the Simmons family and their last remaining fit-to-work bodyguard, arrived at their ward for visiting, but Mrs Fowl presented them with a massive hamper of gifts and food and made such a palaver over thanking them, that they didn't really have the heart to decline the group.

They split down the middle, the two bodyguards silently acknowledging sole responsibility for their party from hereon forth until they rejoined at the end of visiting time. Dom heard Bates welcome them in a surprised tone and felt a pleased that he sounded very well for a man who had been shot in the chest. Bates was nice. He deserved a nice Christmas.

Alexandr paused at his son's door, addressing the Fowls.

"He'll not be expecting you," he said. "So don't expect too much yourselves. He's under constant mild sedation and on a lot of analgesics."

"We understand, Butler," said Eugene, taking his wife's hand, who in turn took hold of her son's. Artemis let her. He wasn't really the hand-holding type, but although he would never admit it, he was quite afraid to see what lay – quite literally – on the other side of that door.

Xandr nodded and pushed the door open.

"Visitors for you, Major," he said, using the title to inform his son before he even opened his eyes, who the 'visitors' would be.

Myles, who had been attempting to read the novel Theresa had brought him before he had nodded off ( _again_ , how irritating… damn sedatives), closed it and attempted to push himself up on his elbows.

"Ah right," he said, trying to focus his brain on speaking 'properly' and cursing his father for not pre-warning him of this. Unfairly, he realised when he thought later. The Fowls rarely made their jobs easy by pre-planning anything. "Good… what time is it?"

"Afternoon," Eugene said, taking the lead after his bodyguard. "And don't bother yourself sitting up, old chap – we just wanted to come and see how you were."

"That's very kind of you, sir," Myles inclined his head to him with a slight smile and Theresa suddenly realised something she hadn't really paid any consideration to before; Eugene Fowl, as intimidating and businessman-like as he was, had in fact grown up alongside Myles and Beckett just as his own son was growing up with Dom. She realised she had never really asked what it was like, working for what may well have been your childhood friend. One day she'd be able to ask Dom, she guessed. The pair of them sidled into the room behind the Fowls, standing by the wall.

"And how are you?" Vivienne asked him, genuine, rather than manufactured, concern painting itself across her slender features. Theresa watched her eyeing the various dressings, tubes and machinery their son's bodyguard was wired up to and realised that although she herself had been immediately heartened to see there was less than when she had last visited him, the Fowl woman was seeing all of this for the first time – and perhaps realising the lengths to which the Butler had gone to to protect her son. Her hand tightened on Artemis's and he squeezed back in a rare moment of reassurance.

The Major pulled the bedsheet up slightly to cover the Frankenstein-esque scene that was his chest, covering the movement with a cough. It was not out of self-consciousness, but out of concern that his charge's usually pale complexion had almost jaded somewhat at the sight. He considered had he known the Fowls were visiting, he would not have declined the hospital gown he had been offered after his dressing changes this morning. As itchy as the bastard things were, Fowl vomit flying around the place was unlikely to lighten the mood any.

"The doctors tell me I'm… doing better," he said, bending the truth only slightly. He was not yet dead, after all, and if he was not heading in the direction of 'better', then he had only a short way to go 'worse'. "Thank-you, m'am."

"Well, that's good to hear," she said, searching around for a seat. Butler provided her with one and she took it. Artemis breaking her grip to stand closer to the man he owed his life to… again. But even though he had thought about this moment since the last time he had seen his bodyguard – when Butler had pulled him and Sophia out of the Bentley and they had seen The Major strapped to a gurney with paramedics all around him barking statistics and requests – he suddenly had no idea what to say.

Seeing his uncertainty – his awkward discomfort in the face of something he had not experienced before, his bodyguard helped him.

"Hello, Artemis," he said, evenly. "Merry Christmas."

"Thank-you, Major," the Fowl boy blurted. "Ahm… I mean hello to you too. But also thank-you, I mean, I owe you more than a 'Merry Christmas', really – the way you acted the other night was nothing short of extraordinary! And how you got us all out safe and well and the fact you're even _alive_ is a miracle and…"

Myles knew smiling would probably be impertinent right now but he was beyond caring about trivial things like propriety.

"That's quite alright, young sir," he interrupted the boy's babbling. "It is the reason your father employs me, after all."

"And speaking of such; I refuse to accept this quite dramatic debacle as you tendering your resignation, you understand, Major," Mr Fowl said, with a wry smile.

"I think 'just doing my job' is quite preposterously humble on this occasion, Major!" Artemis protested. "I _know_ it is what you're employed to do, but even so, I believe you went above and beyond the terms of your employment when you left the vehicle to take on a dozen men single-handedly…"

"Really, sir - I think it was only about seven or eight…" his bodyguard said, unpretentiously.

"Regardless, I admire your bravery and your selflessness and I understand that Madam Ko's Academy educates you very highly on such things but I don't think I ever _really_ understood in full terms what…" he rolled his hand, trying to find the words. "You so fearlessly faced what could have been your own death in defence of myself and Junior - and Sophia, who by all rights was not your responsibility at all - and… we all owe you our lives, Major."

"Courage is not the absence of fear, but the judgement that something is more important than it, sir," The Major told him, glancing over at his nephew. "It was an easy call to make on that night. Life would not have been worth living had I survived and you three had not. It is not hard to be brave under those circumstances. Not to me, at any rate."

Artemis was struck by a rare moment of speechlessness and his father took advantage.

"I think you've made your point, son," he said, not unkindly. "Perhaps The Major would like to hear about your Christmas gifts?"

The Fowl boy talked the most in the next hour, though the others chipped in. Except Dom, of course. He said nothing at all.

When it came to leaving, the Fowls bid their goodbyes and, once Alexandr had checked the corridor for anything more threatening than an unamused matron, allowed the Butler family a moment to themselves.

"We'll wait just here," Eugene assured them. "Tom and Sarah will be out in a moment I'm sure, and McKinnon won't let us come to harm."

Myles wanted to ask which of the remaining Simmons guards 'McKinnon' was, but he must have been half-decent at least, for his father allowed them to leave.

"Your charge can't half talk," he said, once the door closed.

"It was good to see him," Myles replied, sinking back onto the bed in relief. "They're all well, I take it? And Bates? To be honest I'm still surprised he made it."

"So was he," Alexandr nodded. "There was a man with him. Gary, I think he said. I... asked him a few questions. Nicely, of course. Without him Bates would be a few floors down in the morgue not a few doors down up here, for sure."

Myles felt a weight he didn't know he had been carrying lift. He hadn't managed to ask about the younger bodyguard yet beyond learning the man was alive and for that he felt guilty, but for now it was his own recovery - or lack thereof - that was at the forefront of his mind, not anybody else's.

"But he'll survive," Butler continued. "A minor miracle in itself. If you hadn't got one of those new pads on him he'd have been a gonner though, for sure. Good to see they work. I'll have to send a message over and tell them they passed the field test we put them through."

"Hmm," The Major nodded. One day he would get around to telling his father the full story of everything that had happened after he'd hit the floor in the box that night. But for now, he had neither the time nor the energy to do so.

"Butlers; serving up minor miracles since the dawn of time, eh?" Theresa grinned, checking her friend's charts once again.

"Well I refuse to attribute it _all_ to 'sheer dumb luck'," Myles said with a snort. "Any news on who sent the hit team?"

"Not yet. I'll keep you updated," his father said. "I've got people on it."

Myles nodded. Of course he did. It would not be long before they found out who had ordered the hit and heaven help whoever stood in the wrath of Alexandr Butler when he did. The giant may have quite the reputation of a teddy bear amongst his family, but that was as far as it went. To his family. To anyone else, he was nothing less than the great 'Butler' - a name that struck fear into the hearts and cast shadows on the dreams of the hardest of men.

"Ah come on, less of that," Theresa interrupted. "It's Christmas! I don't want to hear about plots of revenge today. What do they class as food in here?"

"Fuck knows," Myles shrugged, comfortable enough to share his true views now there was a door between him and the Fowls. In reality, he was not nearly as chipper had he had faked for his employers and the effort had exhausted him almost completely. "I slept through lunch. Though it's no matter; I suspect I'll get whatever it was for tea."

"Well, good luck to you on that," Theresa chuckled. "Hey – guess what happened at Christmas dinner at the manor today?"

"Someone choked on the pudding charm?" he guessed, drily.

"No, but _kind_ of right…"

"Someone choked?" he frowned, concerned.

"No – not that. But the pudding charm – do you want to tell him, Dom?"

Dom kept his mouth shut, but he rooted in his pocket momentarily and brought out a closed fist.

"You found the charm?" his uncle said, beckoning him over. "Come on, let's see it then."

It was his father who chose the charm that went in the pudding, so Myles genuinely had no idea what it might be. Dom unfurled his fingers, pinching the piece of silver lightly and placing it on his outstretched palm.

"Well look at that," Myles said, holding it up to the light. "A wishbone. I hope you didn't waste it."

He offered it back, but Dom shook his head and took a step back; he wanted him to keep it.

"Dom?" he said, his tone changing slightly. "Come here."

His nephew shuffled closer and his uncle grabbed his hand, placing the charm in it and folding his fingers back around it.

"You keep it. Put it somewhere safe."

The boy nodded, feeling the steadily returning strength in his uncle's grasp. _'Steadily'_ , being the word in question. The man had many more surgeries and weeks - _months_ even - ahead of him before he could be classed as 'out of the woods'.

"Christmas is just another day, remember? Just the twenty-fifth day in the twelfth month," he said. "And maybe not this week. Maybe not this year – you know I don't make promises I can't keep, right? – but I am doing my best to come home. Is that good enough for you?"

Dom nodded averting his gaze. Myles sighed. That would have to be couldn't offer him any more, much less promise him.

"Did you like your present?" he asked.

The barest hint of a smile graced the boy's face and The Major took that as a win.

"Good."

"Yours are back at the manor," Theresa chipped in. "Thought it'd give you some motivation to get home quicker."

"As though I need any," Myles shook his head with a dry chuckle. "Besides, I doubt anything you lot got me is suitable for civilian viewing, right?"

His father smirked.

"I have no idea what you mean. If you think I couldn't sneak a box the shape of a heat-sensing, laser sighted, bonnet mounted, 270 degree anti-hostile missile launcher into a hospital if I wanted to, you are very much mistaken, m'boy."

Myles gaped momentarily. "You haven't..."

"No," his father admitted. "'Resa wouldn't let me."

"No - I mean," he grinned. "You didn't manage to get..."

His father shrugged, face belying nothing. "Well... you'll just have to wait and see."

Myles bounced his fist off the edge of the mattress, which was about as close as he could get to knuckling his father on the elbow.

"If you're playing with me, this is about as mean as the time you told me and Beckett we'd see Santa if we sat out on the roof all night under a camo net."

"That training had two purposes," Alexandr defended.

"We nearly got frostbite!"

"Ach, nearly _schmearly_ ," he grunted. "You were fine."

"We were eight!"

"Exactly. Domovoi - what do you say to spending a night on the roof next year waiting up for the big man? Your uncle just volunteered to join you."

"I did _not_ ," Myles protested. "I'm not freezing my bollocks off waiting out for flying reindeer twice in a lifetime, thank-you."

Dom said nothing, but he shrugged and smiled a little and that was good enough.

"You can help me fix The Bentley when I get back though," he offered. "I think she's going to be a two man job - three, maybe, if Pa will help out. Especially if we've a new bonnet ornament to mount, right?"

"You and that bloody car..." Xandr said, stretching his arms behind his head and yawning. "Anyway, speaking of home; we should be off. Wouldn't do for Eugene to piss off the nurses so much they undo all your hard work getting them onside. I'll see you tomorrow, **_syn_**."

"Tomorrow," The Major agreed. "I look forward to it."

Theresa swooped in to hug him, planting a kiss on his cheek; he rolled his eyes, but buried his head in her shoulder briefly, her hair tickling his neck.

"So what are you going to do with the rest of your day, lummox?"

"Oh, I dunno. I think there's a festive line dancing class on zimmer frames later or something…" he said, sarcastically.

"I would love to see that. Do they do pairs? You and Bates could compete together."

"Bugger off," he said, bluntly. "Go on; off you fuck. I've had quite enough of your good cheer and festive bullying, thank-you"

He exuded 'cantankerous', but the reality was, yet again, his family had bolstered his morale; his motivation. He may slowly be resigning himself to a life quite different to the one he was used to, but that did not mean he had lose himself entirely.

"Read your book," she suggested, as Xandr steered Dom gently to the door, talking softly to him about what he was doing in terms of security as they stepped into the corridor.

"I was when you came in, actually," he admitted.

"That's funny," she put one finger to her bottom lip. "Because I'm _pretty_ sure your eyes were shut when we arrived."

"Alright," he sighed in admittance. "But I _was_ reading beforehand. I'm a couple of chapters into it now."

"Do you like it?"

" _No_ ," he snorted, picking it back up and finding his page. "Where you got the idea I'd like _romance_ novels from I've no clue. Someone bring me a copy of _'Guns and Ammo'_ in next time, would you?"

"Merry Christmas, idiot," she grinned, and left the room.

* * *

 **And as Theresa says, with great fondness; Merry Christmas!**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**

 **24-12-18**


	12. Chapter 11 - Grace

**Thanks to: _ghost235, Jolinnn, Spencerblue_ and _600j_ for the Christmas present reviews!**

 **WARNING: Pain. Major ouchies. Unintentional, but rather fitting pun...**

* * *

 **CHAPTER ELEVEN**

 **"GRACE"**

 _ **Definition: 1) smoothness and elegance of movement 2) courteous goodwill 3) bring honour or credit to**_

 **Undisclosed Hospital, Dublin**

She walked – no, _marched_ – down the corridor until she reached the ward, flashing her recently-acquired door-pass at the sensor and stepping through the door like she owned the place.

That was the secret, you see.

Her also _surreptitiously_ -attained porter's uniform garnered no attention as she glanced through the window into the side-room she had already checked once earlier for reconnaissance. And for initiating phase one of her plan. Still, porter's uniform or no, it would not go unnoticed if she entered a private side room and she paused, waiting for the right moment.

She was of average height, a little stocky in build – but muscular rather than soft, like an ordinary woman of her age. For she was nothing of the sort. No. She was not ordinary, delicate or mild. She was _hard_ ; hard in many ways.

A nurse at the main desk looked up from her paperwork, perhaps realising that she did not recognise the other woman. Perhaps she explained it away as the stranger being a seasonal, relief staff member. Or perhaps concerned about the fact she had never seen her before. She was _perhaps_ about to pass comment when, _almost_ on cue, there was a crash from a room on the far side of the ward and her attention was drawn elsewhere as she stood to investigate.

Without a sound, the stranger slipped into the side-room and locked the door behind her.

He lay prone on the hospital bed, hooked up to so many wires and machines that he looked like some scientific experiment. A super-soldier, perhaps. Or even a Frankenstein's monster. His usually scowling face was calm and smooth, his breathing steady and even, heartrate in time with the soft beeps. He was injured – and badly – but he was alive.

"Wake up," she said shortly, patting him abruptly on the face.

He launched into consciousness, inhaling sharply. There was a _great_ and rather concerning increase in the amount of pain he was in compared to when he last woke up. More surgery, he guessed. The last thing he remembered was spinning into the abyss of forced sleep once more… And lights. He remembered the lights. Masks. Doctors talking in that calm but hurried manner when something unexpected happens…

But that had been the other day, hadn't it? And it was not a doctor that had woken him.

It was not his father, Theresa or Dom in the room with him – nor the Fowls; he remembered their visit suddenly.

Nor was it the matron or any of the nurses.

But he recognised her; with a jolt of surprise, he _recognised_ who was stood at his bedside.

"Merry Christmas," she said abruptly.

"Mhm…" he grunted, his tongue heavy and dry in his mouth, eyes widening.

The doctors had evidently upped his sedation again to keep him quiet, but the pain was counteracting the drugs quite efficiently indeed. He could only think that his father had turned off the painkiller drip again. Although _why_ exactly he thought that was a helpful thing to do, he didn't know. He breathed heavily through gritted teeth and tried to organise his thoughts. The woman's presence could mean one of many things - and none of them were particularly _good_.

"Lie still and listen," she said. "I'm here to get you out of here."

 _That_ was one of the scenarios he had been concerned about. But he did as he was told. He _always_ did as he was told when _she_ asked. He was well-learned in the matter. Besides, if she was here to get him out with a feasible plan, he was all ears. Which was all he could be, really. He was as weak as a kitten in a sack.

"Are you capable of that?" she asked finally, once she had relayed all she had to say. She had spoken just loud enough for him to hear. He didn't like the idea, but he did not have a better one to offer.

"M'not sure I can walk," he admitted.

"Then crawl," she said, simply.

Myles hadn't expected any sympathy.

He nodded slowly stretching his neck the little he could and identifying the various tubes and cannulas poking out of him. They had slowly decreased in number since he had been taken off the life-support machine and he was pleased to see that today he was down to just a few.

"How do you feel?" she asked at last.

"In pain," he said in a short breath, alarmed at how much energy it took to admit the sensation verbally.

"Good," she said, unsympathetically. "It will keep you alert."

He shook his head slightly, grunting. " _Ngh_ … _lotta_ … pain."

 _Too much._ His chest was a crushing barrel of agony, for one. He could barely _breathe_ , let alone carry out his part of the escape attempt she had laid out for him.

"I imagine that'll be because I unhooked the morphine they're doping you with," she told him, matter-of-factly.

So it wasn't his father this time. He groaned something which sounded suspiciously like; _"Motherfu…"_ , but she interrupted him before he could finish.

"It's mixed with sedative; can't be helped," she said – and perhaps she would have shrugged, had she not disapproved such sloppy etiquette. "We will only get one opportunity at this before they move you to a higher security location. I may need you to be sharp in anything as short as a few hours."

Myles thought he might possibly be _dead_ in a 'few hours' if he felt any worse, but there was no arguing with the woman. If she believed he could do it, she was probably right. After all, she was one of the very few people that knew his level of training, his experience, his thresholds. She'd studied him, endlessly. She knew him inside out. Perhaps the only person who knew him any better was his brother – and that was on account of sharing an identical body.

She produced a small, glass vial from her sleeve and that at least distracted him momentarily from the constant relay of pain signals from his injuries and various surgical sites, but it was not to be a pleasant distraction.

"Now open your mouth," she said, unscrewing it.

He clamped his jaw shut and shook his head.

"Changed my mind. M'fine," he said through clenched teeth. "Honestly."

"Myles," she said, sternly, placing a firm hand on his forehead. "You are _not_ a piglet with a worming tablet. Now stop _squirming_ and _open_ your mouth."

His dark eyes had a most uncharacteristically _pleading_ look in them, but she paid no heed, pressing the heel of her hand down onto his skull and he knew that the next step was to hold his nostrils closed.

He reluctantly slackened his jaw.

"Good boy," she said brusquely. "Tongue."

He revealed it sullenly and she shook several drops of an amber-coloured liquid into his mouth.

As expected, it was as though she had poured a litre of petrol down his throat and followed it with a lit match. Every orifice of his head felt as though steam was pouring out of it, his tear-ducts and nostrils streaming with the sharpness. By the time he had, coughing and spluttering, recovered somewhat, she had gone. And despite his despising of her methods, he had to admit he would be more likely to be ready to move when he next saw her, than if he had managed to refuse the contents of the vial. He suddenly felt exhausted again, that small effort enough to sap all but all the reserves he had built up over the past few days. He lolled his head back on the pillow, trying to focus on anything but the pain from the drains stitched into his sides, the pressure inside his chest, the god-awful woozy feeling. He had to rest. As much as his mind would be back on track again a few hours post 'almost anything', it needed his battered body to co-operate. To contemplate even raising himself from the bed was an impossible task right now. He would just have to hope there was a contingency to the plan of action that would consider that. He had a bad feeling that there wouldn't be…

* * *

"I mixed something into my usual Essence of Amber. He won't be conscious enough to notice you, much less remember."

To a passer-by, it would seem she was talking to herself, but a reply came from her side.

"You're sure of it?"

"Of course I'm sure," she said, scornfully.

"Did you get the latest surgery report?"

"Here."

She opened the paper folder she had lifted from the ward and he read it over her shoulder.

"D'arvit..." he muttered. "There's still enough metal and plastic to patch a shuttle with in there! I can't just close the holes up and hope for the best! The mineral poisoning alone would…"

"He's booked for another surgery in a few days time, if it bothers you that much."

"I haven't got a few days to wait around!"

"Then leave and come back," she said, simply.

"I can't do that. It's risky enough meeting with you as it is. I can't promise I'd be able to leave again unnoticed and if The Council…"

"When would you be willing to do the healing?" she interrupted him, clinically.

"When that bullet a sprites-wing width from his spine is removed, for a start," the voice scoffed, the paper ruffling as he stabbed at it with one finger. "Your mud-doctors do that, I'll do what I can with the rest."

"Thank-you," she said – quite the rarity.

"But you know I can't fix this completely," he warned. "Not only will it arise suspicion, your doctors have put so many tubes and stitches in him I would have to pull each one out individually before I…"

"Can you give him a quality of life or not?" she said shortly. "Because if the answer is 'not', I only have one other option and I will take it before we leave tonight. No boy of mine will torture himself mentally as he will whilst he wastes away to nothing in a hospital cot."

"Are all humans as callous as you?"

"Callous? It would have been a kindness rather than suffer as he is now. Organ failure, paralysis, permanent, chronic pain… Xan should have done it himself and give him the coupe de grace on the battlefield, but he's too soft-hearted. The boy entered into this world in the middle of a gunfight, it would have been a fitting way for him to leave it. This... There is no honour in this."

Her companion knew she spoke of the great 'Butler' – who didn't? To infer he was anything less than a ruthless professional was absurd, but yet here she was, accusing him of having too much _compassion_ …

"You're insane," he said, shaking his head a little in awed disgust.

She felt the air currents move beside her as he did so and closed the file with a snap.

"Well as I am conversing with my invisible friend, I don't doubt many would agree with you."

* * *

The Essence of Amber, as downright sinus-devastating as it was, was doing its job.

He felt a lot more alert than he had a few hours ago.

He eyed the door with fresh resolve…

 _I wonder if…_

They'd stop him before he got out, he knew that. But he was curious to see _just_ how far he could get. And bored. Perhaps it was the drugs addling his rationale, but he suddenly felt as though if he could _just_ get out of the ward, if he could _just_ reach a breath of fresh air… That would be some proof that they were wrong. He would recover. _Properly_.

"Stupid," he muttered aloud.

He'd only end up knackering himself up further.

Yep.

It was stupid.

He should give up on the notion immediately.

He closed his eyes, though trying to sink into some sort of restless sleep was about as effective as sinking into the thin pillows. The nurses had replaced his constant supply of painkillers, but lowered his sedation. The result was that he was riding an analgesic wave, boosted by his visitor's potion and with only a hint of tiredness and discomfort holding him back. A dangerous combination for a man of his mentality.

"Psst."

His breathing paused, despite himself. But it was the one, non-mechanical noise he had heard for hours, he was sure of it.

"Hey – Major."

He struggled to some semblance of an upright position on his elbows, too proud to use the controls to raise the bed to 45 degrees.

There was a face at the window of his room. He only saw it fleetingly, but for a moment he was dead certain it was…

"Bates?"

There was no reply.

"Bates? Will?" he said, in a louder hiss. "What are you doing here?"

"Come on," said the voice. "We're getting out of here."

"I can't," he admitted, reluctantly. He paused a moment, then condensed into a few short sentences, everything of interested that had happened to him since he shut the caretaker's door back at the theatre some days ago; "I'm fucked. There was a shootout after I left you and I caught most of the bullets. I'm waiting for… I'm waiting for someone. They're busting me out of here at some point. I can ask if they'll take you along with us. How's the chest?"

Bates didn't reply.

"Bates?" he said again. "Bates! Where are you going?"

But the light flickered at the window and he said no more.

"Fuck's sake," Myles muttered to himself.

But he couldn't just lie back down…

Well, of course he _could_ …

But…

"I'd just like to say out loud for the record," he muttered under his breath as he carefully manoeuvred his weakened legs over the edge of the bed. "This is the worst idea you've had since you jumped in front of half a dozen bullets, Major."

Was Bates even waiting for him?

"Stop talking to yourself and come on!"

OK, he must be.

 _Decision time, Mylo,_ he thought, on a knife edge.

"Alright," he called out, almost to himself. And then to Bates; "But you're going to have to cut me some slack or come help me."

They had warned him that although he was not completely paralysed, his legs would not respond in the same way they had before. He would need to rebuild neural pathways, relearn how to instruct the muscles. Put simply; learn to walk again. Jumping down off the bed and padding quietly out of the room as was his intention, was _definitely_ out of the question.

His toes brushed the cold tiles and though he shivered, he took some comfort in the fact that he could actually _feel_ the temperature of the floor.

He levered himself forward with the arm of the bed, his thumb brushing the buttons on it.

Ha. Perhaps the lessons on how to use the bed controls weren't wasted after all.

After a few false starts, he managed to lower the bed enough to flatten his heels on the floor and tilted some of his considerable weight onto the balls of his feet.

So far, so good. But he was _definitely_ going to need something to lean on.

He scratched his stubble-bristled chin as he thought, a dull tugging pain in his arm alerting him to the obvious.

 _Perfect._

Well, far from 'perfect', actually. The spindly drip stand looked less than ideal, but it would have to do for now.

Very, _very_ carefully and very, _very_ slowly, he began to put more and more weight onto his feet.

The effort was tremendous.

It felt as though ever muscle in his body was trembling and he was relying on his left arm alone to stop himself from falling.

But then he was standing.

Actually _standing_.

 _Fucking good start, lad_ , he thought to himself, cautiously optimistic.

It didn't last long when he realised he would have to remove his vice grip on the bed frame to grab the drip stand. His right arm was essentially useless - unless he wanted his collarbone to fire through his skin, so he braced himself with several deep breaths… and made the grab with his left.

He held back a growl at the jolt of pain he was treated to for the sudden movement, which was easier than one would expect given the concurrent flash of euphoria at his achievement.

 _Baby steps,_ he thought to himself. _Baaaby steps, Myles._

Although doubtless this had not been what Theresa had had in mind when she had said the same thing in one of her many 'motivational' speeches.

It took him the larger part of five minutes to make the two metres to the door. By the time he got there, he was sweating so much the open-backed hospital gown they had provided him with had stuck to the front of him like a sheet of clingfilm and his hand was slipping on the metal pole. But he was nothing if not stubborn.

"Bates?" he panted. "You there?"

There was no response.

"Fuck's sake, Bates… Can you at least open the door?"

Still nothing.

Growling in frustration, he manoeuvred himself and the drip stand alongside the door and used his bad elbow to depress the handle. That hurt more than he had expected it would and the fact that the door opened _inwards_ nearly made him give up there and then. Summoning all of his considerable willpower and not without some grunted curses, he left the room he had been imprisoned in during his stay at the medical facility so far and almost collapsed onto the – mercifully unattended – nurses desk.

A muffled and most un-Butler-like _whimper_ escaped him; if he had had a free hand to stuff into his mouth, he would have used it.

Clenching his jaw so hard he thought he might crack his teeth and inhaling and exhaling so intensely through his nostrils he was all-but snorting like a spooked horse, he composed himself, holding back the ripple of nausea that roiled through him as he made some approximation at standing straight again, albeit slumped over the higher portion of the desk.

When he eventually felt in control enough to open his eyes, he was surprised to see a _tremendously_ fortunately-placed lifeline.

A porter's door pass lay across the paperwork strewn within arm's reach.

Rejoicing in the fact that, until that moment, he had not really thought about the locking mechanism of the ward doors and _had_ he gone straight for the exit, he would have had to come all the way back for the pass, he snagged it and stuffed the lanyard between his teeth.

He eyed his next challenge, the finish line a bright and beckoning glow of one of those novelty, light-up Christmas decorations.

It was a formidable distance.

Relatively speaking, of course.

In reality it was barely more than ten metres of polished hallway to the locked ward door. But that was double what he had just managed and the thought of it almost made his legs give out from under him there and then. His ribs were screaming at him with every breath. He was fairly certain the hole in his leg had started streaming down his thigh again and his damaged shoulder was begging him for a release from the pain.

Unfortunately for his body, his mind had _not_ been damaged and, as such, would not give up so easily.

Straightening up as best he could, he plotted the best route. He would have to stick to the walls, using them as support. He could make it three or four metres, then have a rest. Three stops and he should make it.

It seemed reasonable.

Still, he hesitated; unwilling to leave the safety of his one-armed support on the desk. But even his good arm was shaking and it was rapidly becoming a case of 'now or never'.

"Bates, you'd better have a plan…" he growled.

Hoping the other bodyguard would reappear at some point, he set off for the wall at an excruciating pace.

It was like walking, drunk, across the deck of a boat at high seas. In the Arctic. With ice on the boards. In a backless dress. And heels. And some damn ship's cat threading its way between his ankles every few stumbled strides.

His legs just wouldn't co-ordinate with what he wanted them to do. The noise of the drip stand's wheels scraping along the floor, along with his own grunts of exertion had miraculously not drawn attention thus far, but by the time he had dragged both the stand and his uncooperative body another few meters along the wall, he was beginning to think that, maybe, he had made his point and he didn't need to make it to the door of the ward after all…

But thoughts like that could be fatal...

He pushed on.

Pushed on right until he reached the next door, leaning heavily on the handle with his bad elbow for a moment's relief, or so he promised himself. He leaned to his right, which was a mistake in itself, for his collarbone bent under the strain and he hissed in pain, quelling his sudden nausea with a slow, outward breath, switching his weight over to the hand on the drip stand suddenly to protect it from rebreaking.

And then everything happened at once.

The thin, metal pole bent in half instantly and in his effort not to fall, he crashed his right side against the door, pain receptors lighting him up like the fibreoptic Christmas tree at the far end of the corridor. He made a lunge to stop himself from falling and grasped for the handle. He caught it, but in the process smacked his head off the doorframe, which would have been bad enough, though in addition to punishing his cranium, the action also brought the wildly swinging lanyard within range of the sensor, releasing the lock on the door and subsequently removing his last, solid form of support…

Unable to support his weight unassisted, his legs buckled and he went like a felled redwood, crashing into the room.

The pass clattered to the floor ahead of him and despite his original efforts, his collarbone snapped once more as it took the brutal brunt of the force from his rapid descent. The pain ripped through him from every refractured rib and burst stitch. He had never been one to scream in pain, but if he was ever going to, it would have been then.

As it was, he didn't have to suffer the embarrassment of howling in out-loud agony, only the indignity instead of violently throwing up across the polished tiles as his conscious control of his stomach – in place since he had first left his own room, if he was honest – was relegated to unimportant in favour of not passing out.

He couldn't even _move_ bar for lolling his head forward enough that he managed not to choke on his own vomit as he finally did inhale violently and a guttural noise of suffering ripped forth from him, much louder than before. In so much pain already he deemed it worth a chance and he made a valiant effort at engaging his core muscles to avoid using his arms and sit back up onto his knees. Unfortunately for him, the ripped-open bullet hole in his thigh had pooled enough blood under him that his kneecap slid sideways and instead of raising himself fully upright, he performed some sort of undignified belly-flop - as previously feared - back onto the unforgiving tiles.

 _Well,_ some detached part of himself looked down on his sprawled body in unsympathetic disgust. _That wasn't very graceful_.

He threw up again as he instinctively tried to push himself anywhere but the floor; panicked, like a deer on ice in the sights of a rifle.

 _"Furgh-k!"_ he choked, and collapsed, coughing and spluttering, in abject defeat.

There were several cries of alarm and swift, sensibly-shod feet slapping towards him and, as he teetered on the edge of consciousness, he comforted himself that at least it would only be the medical staff who would see him like this; collapsed half-naked in a pool of his own blood and vomit.

"What the hell, man?" the person whose room he had so spectacularly entered, groaned blearily.

Myles tried to breathe deeply and run some sort of diagnostics test on his battered body now that he had most likely successfully undone whatever healing he had managed to achieve so far. If this man was a threat, he was in no fit state to defend himself.

The light flicked on and he decided that if he was about to be put swiftly out of his misery by a bullet to the skull, it would potentially not be the worst thing that had happened to him this evening.

" _Shiiit_ , are you alright?"

The occupant of the room – who in all honesty, had not previously entered his consideration before they had spoken, and if that didn't speak volumes for his mental state, he didn't know what would – sat up stiffly from a deep, medically-assisted slumber.

"Jesus… Major? Is that you?"

He managed to cough a reluctant, cursing affirmative; raising a one-handed 'thumbs up' in acknowledgement since he could not so much as raise his head off the floor to look at the man.

But he recognised his voice all the same.

It was Bates.

Bates, who had definitely _not_ been out of bed that night.

" _The medications you have been prescribed may cause nausea, dizziness, breathing difficulties, hallucinations…"_

 _Shut up._

* * *

 **Happy Boxing Day!**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**


	13. Chapter 12 - Lift

**Thanks to: _P.S. Sword_ (good to have you back here!), _Fowl Fox, 6000j_** **(got it right this time haha) and _Spencerblue._**

 **WARNINGS: Wolfy attempting to write fairy stuff... Let me know if I need to stick to firefights and car chases haha**

* * *

 **CHAPTER TWELVE**

 **"LIFT"**

 _ **Definition: 1) to pick up 2) to raise something 3) to steal something**_

 **Fowl Manor, Dublin**

"He's taken a bad turn and they're taking him down for emergency surgery. That's all they said," Xandr told her, his words calm and succinct, despite the turmoil going on behind his eyes.

"He's taken a _bad turn?_ How?" she demanded, leaping up out of bed and beginning to crash around the room for her clothes.

He raised his hands, turning away politely as she flung her pyjamas onto the bed and began to dress. "I told you; that's all they said."

"Honest to God, these _useless_ …"

"Theresa," he said, sternly. "We have to trust the professionals on this one. Now get dressed if you like, but we will not be going up to the hospital unless we hear anything further. Understood?"

"But…"

"No buts. I have spent enough of my life outside theatre doors and I can assure you; your presence there will do nothing but give you bedsores on your arse from the god-awful plastic seats. Now if you can't sleep, I will be downstairs. Come and find me and we'll wait for news together."

"Well of course I won't be able to bloody well sleep!" she said, irritably. But he was gone. The door closing behind him with a soft click and for a moment she had to remind herself that she wasn't the only one that Myles was important to.

* * *

 **Undisclosed Hospital, Dublin – Several Hours Later**

"This is by far the stupidest, most dangerous thing you've ever asked me to do."

"Yet here you are," she said, out of the corner of her mouth. "So I'd appreciate it if you stopped with the chatter and got on with it."

"Sorry, what was that, nurse?" the only other conscious man in the lift with them asked.

"Nothing," she said, and jabbed him with a sterile needle straight in the neck.

His gaze had gone blank almost before his knees crumpled and he fell to the floor. Not dead, but unconscious enough that he would not remember the following events that would take place in the elevator in the next few minutes. Which was a shame for him, for they were to be truly remarkable to behold.

"How long have we got on the sedative?"

"Not long enough if you keep jabbering on," she said, unscrewing the lift controls with a miniature screwdriver she had procured from her waistband.

"I would just like to state for the record, this is not one of your better plans."

"Duly noted. Several times," she said, jamming the screwdriver between her teeth and disconnecting some of the internal wires behind the panel.

"Although admittedly probably better than the 'drug him so deeply they take him to the morgue and break him out from there' plan."

"That was also a perfectly workable plan."

"If you say so..."

The elevator shuddered to a stop, all the lights flickering off and leaving nothing but the eerie glow of the emergency beacon above the door, reflected in the mirrors all around them.

"OK. That should buy us a few minutes."

The giant on the bed emitted a low groan.

He was dreaming. He was almost certain of it.

 _Almost_.

His eyes flickered open and it was though he had entered some alternate reality. The air was green and pulsing, the room spinning around him. He closed his eyes again. But not before noticing something vital.

She was back.

He had no way of communicating an acknowledgement of the fact, but she was back by his side; and this time, she wasn't alone.

The person with her was much shorter than her – not entirely unusual, except this male was barely more than half her height and wearing some sort of green jumpsuit. Or maybe it wasn't green. Everything looked green in this light.

"D'Arvit, you certainly can pick 'em," he said in a gruff voice.

Myles blinked blearily at him, trying to reset his focus. The contrast of his vision seemed off too, for the man looked almost magenta in the face against the lime of his overalls. But that, again could have been the green and white emergency lighting messing with his colour perception.

Or the fact that this was another hallucination.

 _Where were they?_

He remembered hitting the floor.

He remembered realising he had been chasing a mirage.

He remembered the _pain_.

He remembered the nursing staff shouting to eachother, trying valiantly but ineffectively to tell him to lie still.

He remembered Bates shouting to him, suddenly falling quiet as they forcibly sedated the other bodyguard.

Then everything rushed forwards at lightning speed.

Again. The same as the other times.

The lights. The masks. The surgery.

He remembered waking up to panicked voices, forcing him back under – he never had taken well to sedation.

"You are running hot," she said, perhaps finally having some sort of misgivings.

Myles didn't know what that meant, but it didn't matter; it wasn't directed at him.

The short man took off his gloves, but Myles found he couldn't even open his mouth, let alone lift a finger to stop him if he was about to attack.

"Hot enough," he replied. "But I'm no healer, Mo. I can't promise you anything. If your surgeons…"

"I am aware of that. Just…" she sighed – and then came the thing which convinced The Major that he really must be dreaming – smoothing a hand across his head.

His eyelids closed automatically with the movement and he struggled to open them again. He felt a light, warm pressure on his side and just at the edge of his vision he could see it was the palm of the small man that was touching him.

"No," he said, shaking his head. "It's no good; I'm going to need a different entry wound. I can't heal him from one with these disgusting pipe things sticking out of it. You're going to need to pull those out too – _Gods_ , you mudmen are barbaric…"

" _Barbaric_ , he says," she mimicked, sliding a knife seemingly from nowhere. "As he asks me to rip out drains and slice open the boy."

"Some ' _boy_ '," the man grunted.

"He'll always be a 'boy' to me," she said, running a thumb down his sternum. "Will here do?"

"Anywhere away from old wounds – difficult this time, I know. There will do."

Myles wanted to say something to stop her – wanted to ask how the hell she thought sticking another hole in him would do any good – but he could do nothing but watch helplessly as she drew a short, horizontal line in his skin with the steel blade. Blood oozed much more slowly than it should from the fresh wound and he felt a curious sensation that was somewhere between pain and pins and needles.

"You'll have to be quick," she said, wrenching out one of the plastic pipes threaded into his torso – and there was no denying _that_ was pain. "I'll leave some of these. It won't do him any harm to remove them when he wakes up. I'll unplug the heart monitor as soon as you start. Another reason mid-transport was a better option. Less chance of someone hearing it and coming running in here."

"Or the morgue, where it would have been more remote and he would have been chilled, which always helps."

"See? Now you're coming around to my way of thinking."

"I never said..."

"Just get on with it before some good Samaritan with a crowbar decides to start 'rescuing' us," she told him.

"Oh brilliant," said the man sarcastically, jumping up onto the bed. "I love working under pressure of exposing my entire race of People by sticking my fingers in some mudman's chest… This may not even work, you do know that?"

Myles blinked up at him, groggily, certain by now that there was yet again some sort of hallucination interfering with his vision, for the man now appeared to be sporting a pair of pointed ears to go along with his positively crimson face. And aside from that, what he was going on about was beyond his current comprehension, though he doubted it would have made much more sense to even a sharp mind.

"I do," said the woman, crossing over to the machinery in readiness. "And as you keep repeating it I can hardly forget, can I?"

"Alright, alright," growled the pointed-eared gentleman, leaping up onto the bed, throwing one leg over the bodyguard's barrel chest and straddling him.

 _This is a really, **really** weird dream, _mused the part of Myles not thoroughly alarmed by everything that had happened since he opened his eyes in the elevator.

"Let's get this over with, shall we?" said the stranger. Then he plunged both thumbs into the newest site of bleeding on The Major's chest and filled his ribcage with what felt like a fireworks display. The giant's back arched, almost unseating the creature jockeyed on his torso, his heart going into overdrive in comeback to the apparent _attack._

The response was a lessening in the voltage of whatever was being forced into him, but it didn't stop entirely.

"Might need you over here, Mo," the man said through gritted teeth. "Pin his shoulders. I'm not sure his heart will take much more of this."

The woman unplugged the portable heart monitor before it became a constant whine.

"I'll concentrate on keeping him alive, you concentrate on doing the healing," she said, pulling on a pair of gloves to protect her from the strange electricity. She placed one hand on each shoulder pressing him firmly to the mattress, pinning him but simultaneously ready to commence CPR if she was needed. "Do it."

Their patient tried to shake his head. Whatever they were doing was _not_ working. His body tried valiantly to flood his system with enough adrenalin to respond to his almost _panicked_ signals to remove himself from the danger.

"It's your call…" the man muttered, hesitating to renew his efforts once more.

"Just get on with it, Julius!"

Myles made some sort of strangled howl like a wounded beast, before his jaw snapped shut forcibly and his eyes rolled back in his head. But just before they did, just before he returned to the darkness once more, he could have sworn his entire body was surrounded by – permeated in, even – tiny, bright blue _sparks_ …

* * *

It was quiet.

Too quiet.

He knew if he listened hard enough he would be able to catch some clue to his surroundings, but his usually focused mind was having a hard time of it, almost as though it was rebooting.

Flashes of disjointed images raced through his cerebral cortex, but every time he tried to focus on them they blazed out of existence until finally, eventually, the peace returned.

He was getting irritatingly used to forgetting what it was he was even trying to remember, but this was even more than that. It wasn't drug induced, he was sure of it. It was like his own brain had filed something away somewhere even he couldn't access it…

 _Click._

He opened his eyes. Training dictated he should not have done that without first exploring his surroundings with every other sense available to him, but the stench of hospital cleaning fluid had already subconsciously revealed to him that he was still incarcerated in a medical facility and that small sound could have been anything from a gun being cocked to…

The door.

The room was empty, but there was the lingering sense of someone having just left it.

He tried to sit up, automatically bracing himself against the onslaught of pain from the movement when he realised, with a rush of incredulous awareness, that he was _not in pain_.

Well, in actuality he was still in a degree of discomfort that would render most human beings at least cringing and whimpering, but after the past week or so of utter agony, it was practically pleasurable.

He looked down at his chest, which was a patchwork of white dressings; all bloodied and… was that _singed?_ His mind waived the concept and he was suddenly hit with the urge to tear back the plasters and inspect the damage for himself.

He did so, scratching his short nails under the tape and peeling it up. The adhesive stretched, tackily and he decided that one swift movement would be the most effective method of removal.

He stripped it back quickly, too shocked by what was revealed to notice the sting.

Underneath the dressing, though it had clearly bled through onto the gauze itself, the wound was negligible. A mere, weeping pockmark compared to the bullet-hole it had been. He bit his lip thoughtfully, trying to decipher what this must mean. Hurriedly, he began removing all of the other dressings he could see. The result was the same. Even the drains in his sides had been almost sealed into the skin, the stitches deep within overgrown flesh.

He grasped one of the tubes between his thumb and forefinger and tugged at it. It moved - barely. Determined, he pulled harder, sliding it free with a sickly, sucking sound. He hissed through his teeth as he did so, tensing up until the plastic tube popped free, blood and remnants of whatever the drain had been removing oozing slowly from the resulting wound.

He held it up to the light, twirling it back and forth slowly. One end – the end which had been inside his body – was misshapen, almost as though it had melted…

A different thought struck him so suddenly that that notion vanished into the ether.

Drains should never be left in long enough that the skin sealed around them entirely. Stitches needed removed after ten days, yet these had clearly been left too long. Bullet holes didn't miraculously fix overnight…

 _How long have I been out?_

The thought pulsed through him like a physical shudder.

This was weeks of healing. Months, even.

He felt better.

He felt almost… _well_.

He threw back the sheet, caution at the forefront of his mind as he suddenly remembered his last attempt to get out of bed.

But this time was different. For one, they had dressed him in pyjama trousers, which was a great improvement on the standard hospital gown, although he would have to find a jacket of some sorts if he was planning on leaving the hospital for the sharp, winter air of the outdoors.

Then again, it might not even be winter anymore.

'Not knowing' bothered him more than he cared to admit, so he lowered himself to the floor, both his shoulders fully functional and strong – a relief as much as it was a bewilderment.

He stood, feeling only slightly unsteady on his feet. And that was more vestibular disturbance of his proprioception than anything sinister.

He'd just get up and see if he could decipher what month it was, he told himself. Not much more.

Nevertheless, he didn't waste any time pulling the canula from his inner elbow.

The window was curtained and he could tell it was dark outside before he even threw them back. Lights twinkled below, reflecting off the frost patterns painted onto parked cars. He touched his forehead to the glass, revelling in the coolness.

It could still very well be March.

He should go check for a calendar or the likes.

Almost smiling at the ease in which he crossed to the other side of the room, he opened the door with measured care and stepped out into the corridor once more, looking around, curiously.

The nurse's desk, the light-up trees... everything was much the same as it had been the last time. Except himself, of course. He was a different man compared to the crippled wreck he had been when he had last attempted such a thing.

Still not quite sure he wasn't just dreaming, he stopped at the door he had unceremoniously fell through previously and tapped softly on it. If the occupant was still a trained bodyguard, he would surely at least notice the noise. If it was no longer Bates, he wouldn't have disturbed them.

There was a rustle on the other side and Myles felt his mouth twitch into a smile.

"Bates," he whispered.

The rustling stopped, then intensified. Within a few seconds, the door was unlatched from the inside and there was William Bates, stood clutching his chest and looking quite surprised to see his trauma-bonded-companion not only upright but also surprisingly healthy.

"Major? What are you doing out of bed?"

"Hello Will," he said, and then; "I was just thinking of leaving, to be honest. Are you fit to come with me?"

"Yeah… sure," Bates said, haltingly. "But you… You were…"

He gestured at the floor. It had been clean for barely more than a few hours.

"Yeah, sorry about that," Myles said, scratching his head somewhat awkwardly. "I was having a bad day."

"Bad _day?_ Major – that was like…" he glanced at the clock on the wall behind him. "Six hours ago!"

"Six hours?" the giant repeated incredulously.

"Uh, _yeah_ ," Bates said, eyeing him as though he was a ghost.

"Jesus…" Myles murmured to himself. "It's an actual Christmas miracle."

"What?"

"I don't know," said the Fowl bodyguard. "I don't know what's going on here, but unless this is another hallucination, it's something really weird. Either way, I'm running with it. Are you coming?"

"Well yeah, of course I'll come with you," Bates said, grabbing the top blanket from the bed and stuffing his feet into some hospital-issue slippers. "And this isn't a hallucination. Unless I'm having one too."

"Well of course you'd say that," The Major frowned. "You'd say that even if you were imaginary."

"Put this 'round you," Bates said, tossing him the blanket and looking thoroughly perturbed as he eyed the semi-healed scars spattered all over the larger bodyguard's chest. "You look like a busted voodoo doll and you don't want to get _imaginary_ frostbite when we get outside."

They made quite an interesting pair, stalking pre-dawn through the corridors of the hospital.

"So what's the plan?" Bates asked, once they were some distance from the ward they had set out from.

The Major was silent for a few seconds. Long enough that the Simmons' guard began to think his companion didn't _actually_ have a plan at all.

"I have a lift for us. It's just a case of working out where she'll most likely be."

"You don't have a rendezvous site?"

"I was a bit preoccupied with basic survival functions to ask when we last met," The Major said, a little tetchily.

"Alright, alright," the younger guard said, holding up his hands. "I'm not being ungrateful, I'm just asking. Anything I can do to help?"

"Look as friendly as possible so that you don't get shot when we find her, if you can manage that."

"Great," said Will, trying to work out whether the man was joking or not.

He wasn't.

They weren't stopped as they exited into an alley behind the hospital, though Bates paused at the doorway. Snow was swirling, concealing the ugliness of the rubbish bins under its pristine flakes.

"What?" Myles paused, already on high-alert for anything that might pose a threat to either them or their escape attempt.

"You haven't even got any shoes on," Will pointed out. "Neither of us are armed, we're both dressed in pyjamas and it's probably about max minus five. We'll be missed as soon as the shift handover is complete and then what?"

"We'll be long gone by then," The Major said confidently, stepping onto the freshly-fallen snow as though it was a warm, plush carpet under his bare feet. "And besides – I'm always armed."

He made a disturbingly – or so Bates thought – out-of-character attempt at a 'jazz hands' gesture.

"Has anyone ever mentioned to you that you're insane?"

The Major laughed to himself. He liked this guy.

"Yeah? Well you're the one following me," said the Fowl bodyguard. "So I'd take a look at my own sanity if I were you."

Bates laughed to himself. He liked this guy.

" _Touché_ ," he said, pressing his hand to his chest and striding out after him.

Which was almost the last thing he ever did.

"Shit!" he yelped, as something deadly pinged off the metal dumpsters.

" _Woah, woah, woah!_ " Myles barked rapidly, spinning back and grabbing Bates by the shoulder, standing squarely in front of him. "Stop! Stop it – he's with me!"

The alley remained still but for their elevated breathing, both bodyguards scanning the area rapidly. The Major kept his hand solidly on Bates' shoulder.

"It's OK," he said, slowly and clearly. "He's a friend."

Silence reigned for another few seconds and then, seemingly materialising in the gloom, a figure stepped forward.

"Since when do you make a habit of making _friends?_ "

Myles breathed out quietly in relief, letting go of Will's shoulder and stepping forward.

"Since people started taking bullets for me," he asserted. "I owe him."

Bates made as though to speak, to explain that in all actuality he had merely taken a bullet – it would not have hit The Major otherwise and really, the debt had already been repaid by saving his life back in the theatre. The words were on the tip of his tongue, but his new 'friend' shut him up with a glare.

The woman looked at him critically.

"Can he run?"

"Yes," Myles answered for him.

"If he can keep up, you can bring him along," she sighed. "But I am not dilly-dallying for his sake."

Bates wasn't very sure he _could_ run, actually, but he kept his mouth shut in favour of not getting shot. He also didn't mention he wasn't keen on being treated as though he was some stray animal a child was asking his parents to keep hold of.

The stranger holstered her gun and set off at a swift march.

"Come on. The vehicle's this way," she said by way of explanation. She didn't look back. "Hurry up!"

The bodyguards looked at eachother.

"Best go. Yes - she's always like this," said Myles with a sigh.

"Just a shot in the dark here," Bates said, trying to keep his breathing even in the icy air as they slogged after the woman. "But is she... a relative of yours?"

"However did you guess" Myles drawled.

* * *

 **Hope you're all enjoying this week where nobody knows what day it is or what they're supposed to be doing other than eating and sleeping off whatever they ate haha**

 **Wolfy  
ooo  
O**

 **28/09/2018**


	14. Chapter 13 - Reunion

**Thanks to: _2whitie, P.S. Sword, Jolinnn, Spencer blue, Steinbock_ and _Shadow914_ \- cheers guys for keeping me going!**

 **WARNINGS: MOTHERSHIP COMING IN TO DOCK.**

* * *

 **CHAPTER THIRTEEN**

 **REUNION**

 _ **Description: Coming back together again as a whole**_

 **Fowl Manor, Dublin**

"What do you mean he's _gone?!_ "

Xandr gave a sigh that was somewhere between irritated and exasperated. He had summoned her to his room once he had taken the call. She was the first person who needed to know, after all. He would tell the Fowls later, if he deemed they needed to hear the news.

"Exactly as I said."

"The last time you spoke to them he was only just out of surgery! I wasn't even expected we'd be allowed to visit - how the hell can he be _gone_?!"

"I don't know," Alexander shrugged. "He came back from surgery a couple of hours ago and now he's… not in his room."

"He only came off life support a few days ago!" she ranted on. "How the hell have they _lost_ him?!"

"I think it's much more likely to be a case of him going walkabout than they've _misplaced_ him as such," Xandr said placatingly. "And what's more, he's not the only escapee."

"Oh so they're in a habit of _mislaying_ patients, are they? Wonderful. Is there a discount on the 'Missing' posters that you're so delighted about?"

"No…" Butler said slowly. "But it does suggest there's something more to this 'disappearance' than you might first think."

"When we find him why not just bring him back here and we'll care for him ourselves. At least then we might get away with chaining him to a bed. Honest to God…" Theresa ran her hands through her hair. "Who's the other guy, then?"

"Bates."

"Who?" - the name rang a bell vaguely.

"The Simmons guard from the theatre," Xandr explained. "To be perfectly honest I didn't think it was looking very good for him when I found him, but I was too busy looking for our boys to bother much more about him. The Simmons family visited him at Christmas. Seemed a nice enough lad. Stayed behind after I got shot, anyway. Myles seemed to like him."

"And what makes you think that?"

"He tied up one of the hitmen and put him under threat of death to keep the guy alive," Alexandr said. "Used our medical kit on him too. Would have been much easier to kill all the hostiles and give Bates the _coupe de grâce_ , if he was so inclined."

"And I take it you did?"

"Well no – obviously I carried Bates out."

"I meant the other guy."

"I was saving my bullets."

"But did you kill him?" Theresa asked, wise to the fact that there were over hundred different ways the bodyguard could have killed the man with one hand, let alone a weapon.

"No," Xandr admitted. "I need him for questioning. I know where to find him if I need him again."

Theresa sighed, leaving the subject there. She was as keen as anyone to find out why the Fowls had been targeted that fateful evening, but she knew 'questioning' was just a milder term for what The Butler had in mind.

"Great. So Myles has recruited an accomplice and broken out of the hospital two hours after major surgery. Now what? Where would he go?"

"Well to begin, we can't be sure he's actually left the hospital. He may be laying low somewhere in the building."

"Unlikely. He hates the place."

"Granted, but he's not an idiot. He wouldn't start out from a place of safety without provisions or outside help."

"He _has_ help – how badly can this Bates guy be injured if Myles is dragging him along too?"

"And as for _where_ he would go," Xandr continued, regardless. In reality, it would more likely be Bates dragging Myles out, with the severity of his injuries. "Well in all honesty, my best bet would be, well... _home_."

There was a timely buzzing sound alerting the pair of them to one of the manor's side gates being opened from the outside. Xandr had all the alarm systems wired to both his and his sons' rooms so that they were first to know of any breach of the perimeter, regardless of the origin.

"You couldn't fecking write this, could you?" Theresa exclaimed. "I swear, if the idiot has trekked all this way in the snow, I'm going to kill him myself before the hypothermia does…"

She blasted from his room with such speed that even the Butler's long strides were stretched to keep up.

"Tradesman's entrance," he called to her as she reached the bottom of the stairs and she changed tack, spinning left instead of right and marching towards the staff kitchen, muttering under her breath as she went. Nobody knocked at the kitchen door but the security light flicking on alerted her to a presence and she began undoing the multiple bolts and locks.

"Myles Butler, if you've been this fecking stupid I swear…" she mumbled, threateningly.

But when the door swung inwards, it wasn't Myles on the doorstep.

In fact, it wasn't anybody she had ever met before.

Suddenly thinking how stupid she had been not to wait for Pa to get to the door first, she faltered.

"Ah," said the woman, in clipped, English tones. "Efficient service. What a pleasant surprise."

"Excuse me? Who are you?" Theresa said, valiantly attempting to block the door.

The woman barely gave her a glance as she folded Theresa's blocking arm with one thumb and stepped swiftly past her. The Irishwoman made as though to stop her again but Xandr halted her instantly.

" _Easy_ , Theresa. It's alright," he said, evenly. And then to the woman who had marched into Fowl Manor as though she had claim to the place; "Hello, darling."

For a moment everything was still. Theresa looked from one to the other, suddenly realising what the greeting meant. The usually impenetrably stoic face of the eldest Butler of the manor was adorned with an almost _soppy_ expression of fondness and for the barest flicker of a second, the stranger looked the same. Then the moment passed.

"Get the kettle on, Sasha," she said, barely offering him a second glance. "These two moping Mildreds need something hot down their throats."

"Yes dear," he sighed, hopping to it immediately. Some things never changed.

Theresa missed the exchange beyond the words _'these two'_ , for she had already rushed back to the door. There, making their way painstakingly across the snow, to some degree holding eachother up like a pair of drunkards returning home on New Year's morn, were the two bodyguards.

They were both as pale as the grey light of dawn, the larger looking in slightly better fettle than the smaller, though both shivering just as much as the other as they limped the last few steps to safety.

Theresa folded her arms; every bit the chastising mother-figure, and when he finally looked up, that was what Myles saw.

"Hi 'Resa," he said, meekly.

"Hello _idiot_ ," she retorted.

But her resolve was not as honed as the Butler matriarch's and she cracked, swooping forward to help the pair inside. Bates, being the unsteadier of the two, helped himself to the kitchen table and sank down into a wooden chair in utter exhaustion. Mrs Butler had pushed them hard over the last few K. She had driven most of the way there, but stopped just under three miles from their destination, insisting that they leave the car in a pub carpark and walk from there. She had, of course, had the foresight to pack them some outdoor clothes, complete with a set of boots a piece, but how she had known Bates would be coming along, neither could guess. Will had put the query to his new friend who had merely shrugged, wincing as bent double to tie his laces – 'she always does', had been the only reply.

Theresa closed the door with a thud, cutting out the draft from the outside world and instantly raising the ambient temperature of the room by a few degrees. Myles leaned on the wall heavily, taking long, slow breaths and trying not to repeat his earlier performance of collapsing into a pool of vomit. He was repaired, certainly. The mysterious creature in the elevator had healed all life-threatening ailments; the organs which would otherwise have needed replacing, were now fully functional. The bones which had been fractured, had now fused. The paths the bullets had taken through his body had been all sealed up, but for the external edges. He was better than he ever could have been had he been left to heal naturally. He would be able to work again. But by no means was he one hundred percent yet. Most external injuries had been left to evidence his trauma. Some of the lesser wounds were left partially healed. And to boot, his mind – unable to process such a magical recovery – was bombarding him with phantom, psychological pain signals warning him to avoid further damage to injuries which now barely existed. He closed his eyes, breathing in the scent of home and for the first time since the first shot had been fired in the theatre all that time ago, feeling a comfortable grade of _safe_.

"I swear if I didn't think I would knock you on your arse for once in your damn life I would _slap_ you," Theresa growled at him. "What on _Earth_ were you thinking even getting out of bed in your condition? You could have killed yourself! You _still_ could have killed yourself!"

He cringed, pup-like and shot her an apologetic grin, keeping his eyes half-shut to avoid the full force of her glare.

"I promised Dom," he panted.

"You promised him you'd come _home_! You didn't put a time limit on it!"

He shrugged a little, unable to put any more effort into verbalising his defence.

"I've a good mind to ring the hospital and get them to send an ambulance to pick you both back up," she warned. "And don't think I wouldn't get your father to restrain you until they did."

Myles shook his head slowly.

"He wouldn't get past Mum," he said a little breathlessly, grinning at the floor.

The statement confirmed what she already thought to be true, but she was still in disbelief.

"So that really is your mother?" she whispered, gesturing at the woman who was appraising the other giant in the room.

" ** _Vy stali tolshche,"_** she drawled, pinching his side mercilessly.

" ** _No ty takoy krasivyy kak den' kogda ya v posledniy raz smotrel na tebya_** ** _,"_** he quipped back, catching her hand in his colossal fist and raising it gently to his lips.

" ** _Zatknut'sya,_** dolt," she scoffed, snatching it back and punching him solidly in the arm.

"You hear anyone else talking to Pa like that?" their youngest son chuckled.

"Why, what did she say?" asked Theresa, who's grasp of the Russian language was not nearly good enough to catch the lowered voices.

"She said he's gotten fatter," Myles translated with a grunt of amusement.

Theresa's eyes widened incredulously. Alexandr Butler was by no means overweight. _Oversized_ , definitely, but he was incredibly fit and toned for a man approaching pension-drawing age. Not that Butlers commonly retired, of course. Or at least not if it wasn't forcibly.

"And what did he say to her?"

"Oh he just told her she's still just as beautiful as when he last saw her," the younger bodyguard shrugged. "He's a schmooze – total softy."

"Yes," Theresa mused. "Seems to be a running theme in the family, if I'm honest."

"Bad trait, Mother would say. They should beat it out of us as children," he said, groaning slightly as his legs finally began to give up the ghost on standing. "Can I sit down now? Please?"

"I suppose," she said, with mock begrudgement and pulled him up a chair to hobble towards.

He sat down cautiously, gratefully accepting the mug of hot tea his father placed in front of him as he did so.

"Your mother tells me it's just taken you nearly an hour to get from _'The Hound'_ ," he said, naming the pub they had left the car in.

Myles took a careful gulp of his drink, aware of his father's penchant for making brews whose temperature rivalled that of the sun. Bates was not so lucky and coughed suddenly, spitting the tea mostly back into the mug. He apologised, but only Theresa took any notice; smiling at him reassuringly and offering him a tea-towel.

"What do you expect?" Myles muttered. "I was half-dead until this morning."

"Half-dead?" Xandr snorted. "A few flesh wounds, is all."

"I refuse to be ridiculed by a man who got himself shot in the head and landed us all in this mess," the youngest Butler at the table retorted hotly.

" _Ah_ but I was shot just the _once_ ," Xandr smirked, enjoying himself.

"Irrelevant," Myles grouched. "You were out of action and I… I thought you were dead."

Xandr barked a laugh at him and Bates, bravely, Theresa thought, chipped in.

"With all respect, sir," he said. "I thought you were dead too."

"Don't 'sir' me, Bates," Xandr told him, seriously. "I told you. Call me Butler. I will not be _'sir'd'_ by a man who is no doubt a large part of the reason my charge's son and my grandson are still alive."

Bates looked relieved. "They got out safely then? The children, I mean."

"Yes they did," Alexandr nodded. "And of course I've you to thank for hauling this **_durak's_** arse over a few stiles, I dare to think."

Myles scowled into his mug, but wouldn't give his father the satisfaction of taking the bait.

"Oh I don't think that was quite the case, s… Butler," Bates said with an apologetic glance at his friend.

"Yes, yes, all very touching," Maud Butler cut in. "But what's the plan from here on in. I got them home, what are you going to do about the charges. We can hardly explain away such a miraculous recovery."

"What miraculous recovery?" Bates said, though his words seemed slightly slurred to Myles and Theresa and he suddenly slumped forward.

Myles caught him by the elbow, steering him away from his hot drink and letting his head lower to the table without banging off it.

"Jesus, Ma," he said, indignantly. "You could have at least warned me – he could have burned himself…"

"Is he oka...?"

A gentle thud alerted him that Theresa had just done the same as Bates.

"Ah _great_ ," he muttered, his hands feeling strangely light as he rearranged her head onto her arms in a more comfortable position. "How long have I got?"

"How much is left of your brew?" his father asked.

"Maybe a third," he said, pushing it away before he too almost collapsed into it.

"About five seconds then, I suspect," Maud said nonchalantly.

"No... fair… Ma…" he mumbled, laying his head on the table before it lolled there anyway.

"Ah cute. It's like watching him be ten years old again throwing a tantrum because you confiscated his throwing knife for stabbing his brother."

 _He stabbed me first,_ is what he wanted to protest, but Myles didn't even have the energy to make a hand gesture at his father for that comment, which was probably just as well.

" _Cute?_ " his mother mocked, her voice zooming in and out of focus. "You really are sap, Xandi..."

* * *

 **So, we have a Maud Butler! Also known as Ma, Mum, Mother Butler, Poison Granny - the latter because she likes to create various potions to... do various shit to people she either likes or dislikes.**

 **Hope you like her - and 'Xandi' together, of course.**

 **If I don't post tomorrow, HAPPY NEW YEAR to all of you. I hope 2019 is a good'un!**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**


	15. Chapter 14 - Awakening

**HAPPY NEW YEAR!**

 **Thanks to: _Shadow914, P.S. Sword_ , _6000j_ and _Hartemis Shipper_ (times a dozen, welcome along. And if you're worried about The Major dying at any point, go read _Dead in Absentia_ , I fixed that little issue ;] )**

 **WARNINGS: Long chapter. Could've been two short ones but there was an even enough break. So here you go, if you can make it through it. Contains.** **Gruff!Fluff and some explanations. Sort of. Also, Theresa making Myles awkward. Because that's always fun for you guys to read (sorry Mylo).**

* * *

 **CHAPTER FOURTEEN**

 **AWAKENING**

 _ **Definitions: 1) Rising from sleep 2) Taking on new knowledge which changes one's opinion on a matter**_

 **Fowl Manor, Dublin**

When he awoke, quite some hours later, and his eyes flickered open, he was pleasantly surprised to see the familiar ceiling of his own room, rather than that of a hospital.

 _Wait…_

He had been in hospital?

 **Yes.**

His head felt like it was trapped between a vice. There was a strange ringing in his ears he would normally associate with an explosion.

 _Was there was an explosion?_

 **No.**

Couple of bullet wounds, that was it.

 **Yes.**

He closed his eyes as the ringing intensified. He felt almost as though his thoughts were not his own. Which was ridiculous. Who else's would be in his head?

But he did remember being shot…

 _Not 'a couple' of bullets – it was seven…_

 **No.**

Miraculous he wasn't more seriously injured, actually…

 _I was!_

 **No.**

The hospital must have let him out in time for New Year.

 **Yes.**

 _They didn't! I…_

The ringing in his ears intensified and his mind raced to find a solution; to make it stop.

Why was he here?

 _Wait._

The hospital had let him out, right? Hadn't they?

 **Yes.**

Here he was, at the manor, after all…

 **Yes.**

That must have been it.

 _Right?_

Wrong...

He scowled, squeezing his forehead in one hand.

He must have had some sort of head injury to be this confused, surely?

He couldn't focus on anything beyond his immediate position.

Although it'd be easier to think without this damn headache…

 _Head injury. Definitely._

Going with that excuse, he sat up slowly. On his bedside table there was a note, handwritten in blocky capitals.

* * *

 **MY BOY,**

 **WE HOPE YOU SLEPT WELL.**

 **WHEN YOU'RE READY, COME AND FIND US.**

 **I HAVE CLEARED YOU TO STAY HOME BUT YOU ARE OFF DUTY UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE – THIS IS A NON-NEGOTIABLE CONDITION OF YOUR RETURN.**

 **TAKE IT EASY ON THE STAIRS!**

 **PA & MA**

* * *

 _This is bizarre,_ he thought.

It was as though he had been transported back in time. He tried to remember the last time his father had left him a note and signed it off from both his parents.

His brain wouldn't even focus on that concept.

Why was his mother here?

Why did he need clearance to stay home?

Why did his father feel the need to use a five syllable hyphenation when he clearly knew full well what his mental state would be when he woke up?

All of these were vague considerations in his head, overlayed by a more prudent wondering:

What the _hell_ had his mother put in his tea?

 _Their_ tea, he remembered, all thoughts of what had landed him in hospital – or got him out of it – fading from his mind as he swung his legs off the bed and began to contemplate getting up. Although doubtless Theresa and Bates, with their much lower tolerance for Maud Butler's concoctions, would be asleep a fair few hours more.

He yawned and stretched, halting in a preemptive wince before his arms reached their full wingspan. But the crippling pain stayed vanished.

 _Wait._

 _What pain?_

It was though it was a memory of a memory he could not quite grasp and the more he tried, the less he could hold it. He was teetering on the edge of recall, like snatching at a dream in the few seconds after you wake up.

But he was a rational man. And the rational explanation here, was very clear:

 _Bloody drugs._

He dressed casually – he was off duty, after all. Apparently.

Quite the rarity.

The corridor was empty and quiet. He decided the most likely location for his parents at this late hour of the morning and his feet took him automatically to the stairs. But as he reached them, he snatched at the handrail at the top, breathing out deeply before he took the first step as a wave of vertigo hit him; not a useful condition when one's head already hovered some seven foot in the air.

"I didn't expect to see you up yet."

He opened his eyes. It was his father, stood at the bottom of the flight, looking up at him.

"Well, I like to…" he took the second step, then the third without hesitation. " _Exceed_ expectations."

He made a solid effort at making the rest of the descent looked controlled and casual, but the last step almost broke the façade. His father's hand was on his elbow before his massive frame could fully unbalance.

"If you didn't expect me to be up yet, then why were you waiting for me?" Myles grumbled, pulling away the moment his vestibular system was back online with the gradient of the ground floor.

"Because, my son, I know _you_ ," Xandr sighed, folding his arms. "How do you feel?"

"Fine," he stated stoutly.

"How do you _feel_ , Myles?" came the firmer repetition.

He'd asked that before.

Days ago?

A _lifetime_ ago.

When his body was wracked with a torment of pain.

 _How do you feel?_

 _Like shit._

 _Obviously. Specifics?_

The specifics were a multitude of fractures and bullet holes, organ damage, nerve damage. Some of it definitely permanent. Life-changingly, career-endingly, _definitely_ permanent…. _right?_

 **No.**

"Confused," he settled on.

His father's lack of response told him he wanted to hear more.

"I've got… some memory loss, I think," he admitted, hesitantly.

"What makes you think that?" Alexandr asked, gesturing for his son to follow him to the staff kitchen.

"I don't know. I just keep having these… blocks. Like my brain is rerouting around potholes. Only when I stop and look down into them, I just see myself reflected back."

"Very artily put. You should write poetry," Xandr said, amused. "Are you sure it's not just the effects of whatever your mother put in your tea?"

"If it is, she's using something new," Myles frowned, ignoring the jibe. He and Beckett had uncovered as teenagers that their father himself was prone to the odd piece of creative writing. "I've never had psych-effects this bad before."

"Ah, you know her; she's always developing some thing or other," his father shrugged.

Myles ' _hmmed_ ', unconvinced.

"Where is she?"

"Your mum? Out in the gardens," Xandr told him. "Harvesting for her next trick, most likely. You know she uses the grounds to plant things she wants growing correctly. Brew?"

"Only if it doesn't happen to _be_ Mother's ' _next trick'_ ," he muttered, sitting down at the wooden table.

He traced his finger around the water-ring Bates' mug had left earlier, the thought of Bates bringing yet more flashes of disjointed images…

"Myles?"

He opened his eyes with a sharp inhale, as though his father's voice had lifted him out of a pool of water, rather than her memories.

"Let it go, **_syn_**."

"Let _what_ go?" he scowled.

"You _know_ what. Some things…" he paused, sighing as he looked out of the window. "Some things are better left unexplained."

"I don't _like_ unexplained things," he said, sullenly.

"I know. But do you trust me?"

"What?" he scoffed. "Of course I…"

"Do you _trust_ me, Myles?" his father said, turning his steely eyes on his youngest son. "Completely?"

Myles thought. His father had raised him from birth. He had nurtured him, guided him, chastised him, trained him. He had taken bullets for him. And taught him to take bullets for others.

"Of course I do," he said at last. "With my life. With everything."

"Then _let it go_ ," he said, leaning back on the counter.

Myles took a breath. This wasn't something he could just ignore…

He stood, somewhat stiffly and followed his father's previous gaze out of the window. Although he already knew what the outcome would be if he pressed his mother for an answer.

"What's bothering you the most?" Xandr said, holding out the mug for Myles to take.

"I just don't understand…"

"Incoming," Xandr mused aloud, pulling the mug back out of reach.

"What?" he frowned, eyeing the removed tea as though it had suddenly occurred to his father that it, too, was drugged.

"I _said_ …" the older man began to repeat, inclining his head at the door to the hallway beyond.

Myles turned, but by then it was too late to do anything but stand and bear the brunt of the attack.

A streak of untameable energy flew through the kitchen door at high speed and leapt into the air from a distance of about five feet, attaching itself around his neck with wiry arms, burying its face in his chest.

 _Oh. **That** kind of 'incoming'._

"Hey, kiddo," he said, with a sigh and an exasperated glance over his shoulder at his father. Their conversation would have to wait. Resisting the urge to shrug his nephew gently to the floor, he threw his arms around his back and instead drew him closer to his broad chest. The boy's fingers wound into his shirt, tightly as he buried his face into the cotton.

"I knew you'd come back," he mumbled, voice cracking from lack of use and the emotion strangling his throat. "I _wished_ it. I mean, I knew you'd be ok… but I wished it anyway… and… and…"

He knew, even at that age, that he couldn't ask for an impossible promise; that he'd never leave him like that again, that he'd never put himself in that much danger, that he'd never _scare_ him like that again. It was his job. It would be this boy's job too, one day.

"Hush," his uncle said, softly, when he crumpled into a hitched-breathed silence instead. "Easy, easy there. It's alright; I'm here. I'm here now and…"

He glanced back at his father again, who smiled gently at them.

He couldn't promise he'd never leave again. He couldn't promise not to get shot or injured. But that didn't matter. _Right now,_ mattered.

"I'm here now and I gotcha," he murmured into his thick head of hair. "I've got you, Dom."

And although he didn't say the words, that was as much of an 'I love you' as the boy ever needed to hear.

* * *

 **Servant's Quarters Sitting Room, Fowl Manor, Dublin**

"So is your mother Russian, then?" she asked.

"Mum?" Myles said, the word sounding strange out of his mouth. "No, no. She just speaks it. Learnt it so she could talk to Pa's side of the family. Not that they don't speak English, obviously."

"Oh right."

They were sat in one of the many, lesser-used sitting rooms, dedicated to the staff of the manor. Earlier in the night, they had been sitting with the three generations of Butlers and Theresa. It had been a nice evening. Pa had told war stories, his wife had corrected the more exaggerated details mercilessly, Dom had listened in awe and Myles had chipped in where the tales involved him and his brother;

"We were _three_ actually, when you had us crawling through air vents – at four we would have been too big."

"Three, four – whichever," Maud Butler waved his comments away. "You were small. And ultimately more useful."

"Useful for laying toxic gas cannisters into ventilation systems, perhaps – but four-year-old me couldn't exactly hold a gun!"

" _Four-year-old you_ didn't ever get himself shot, either," she told him with a tut. "Besides, both you and Beckett were handling weaponry before you could hold a pen - you most certainly picked up a gun before you were four."

"How am I in competition with my infant self?" the bodyguard asked, exasperated.

"Now, now My-boy; you know everything's a competition with your mother," Xandr rumbled, amused.

"Exactly," his wife said with a glance at their grandson who was sat at their feet cleaning a disassembled handgun his grandfather had given him. "You, for example, boy; you're going to beat your dad and uncle's record when you graduate from Ko's, aren't you, my little house demon?"

"Yes, Granny," Dom smiled up at her and she patted his head with something akin to affection.

"Little _demon_ indeed," his uncle grumbled. "Damn right you better beat us. You've got two generations of the best of the best training you, after all."

"Well, if you remind me to visit more often, he will," his mother said with a rare smile. "Now then, Boggart Boy; bedtime. I want you well rested for training at dawn, understood?"

Dom looked a little miffed, but he knew better than to argue with his grandmother. Besides, the promise of a dawn training session was more than enough to chivvy him along to bed. She got up, walking around the back of the sofa and placing her hands on either side of her husband's head, rocking it back to lock eyes with him as she looked down. It looked just short of uncomfortable and it was certainly strange to see the usually guarded man allow his throat to be exposed like that. She murmured something in Russian to him that made him smile in a way that could quite possibly have been described as _adoring_ , had it not been adorning the face of an otherwise terrifying giant.

"Goodnight, My-boy. And you, Autumn-girl," she said, inclining her head to each of them as she left the room.

Theresa felt oddly pleased she had received some sort of nickname from the Butler matriarch and decided to try to fathom the reason behind it later.

"Come on, Kingdom," Xandr said, pushing himself up off the couch cushions with a barely concealed groan of looming joint pain; he was not as young as he once was and all this lugging around half-alive carcasses had taken its toll on him. Although unlike others his age, he would be a fine after a couple more days of stretching and recovery - and perhaps a potion or two from his wife. " ** _Babulya_** has spoken and we menfolk must do as we're told; that gun is clean enough for now."

Dom scrunched up his face a little, but obediently stopped what he was doing, hands flying across the pieces until the handgun was once again as one; in thirty seconds. He would never falter again – not for as long as he lived. He handed it over almost reverently and Myles was pleased to see he seemed to show no fear of the weapon, despite so recently seeing what it could do close-up.

"Can I stay up for five more minutes with Mam and Uncle?" the youngest Butler said, pleadingly as he offered the weapon over.

"No, no, you're coming with me, **_ditya_** ," Xandr rumbled as he took the gun with one hand and with the other, grabbed his grandson by the wrist, slinging him upwards so that he could hang from his shoulders like a cape. The boy made a short noise of delighted surprise, all protest at 'bedtime' dropped in favour of a piggy-back ride up the stairs from his grandfather. It had been a favourite of his when he was a few years younger. A rarity now, though. Replaced by more 'proper' behaviours. Theresa smiled at him. Her little boy was growing up too quickly for her liking.

"You two can stay up though, if you like," Alexandr said, as he shrugged Dom higher around his neck. "Half an hour or so, mind."

"Well I'd like to see you carry us up the stairs," Theresa jested.

"Don't tempt me," Xandr chuckled. "I might just have to prove I can."

She laughed and looked to Myles, who shrugged in a way which suggested 'I'm not arguing with him'.

"On a more serious note," the Butler patriarch added. "Myles, you're still off duty – understood? I don't want to see you up until you've had a good eight hours at least. _Rest_ is what you need for now."

Theresa almost chuckled at her giant friend being given a strict sleeping schedule, but she kept her comments to herself. Myles himself sighed.

"If you insist."

"I do. And you, aren't you going to say goodnight, boy?" he prompted, jiggling his grandson's wrists.

"Night Ma, night Uncle," the boy said, albeit somewhat muffled into his grandfather's broad back.

"Night darling, have a lovely sleep," Theresa said, blowing him a kiss.

"And a good training session. You'll have to train for me too, since I'm on enforced bed rest," his uncle added.

"I will," Dom grinned in answer to both of them, as his grandfather ducked him under the doorway.

It had not been a long period of silence before she had started to ask him about his mother and Myles could see Theresa wanted to ask more. But she knew how cagey he could be with information. He sighed, predicting her quest for knowledge once more.

"It's Pa's mother's side that the Russian stuff comes from," he said, by way of explanation. "Obviously the Butler name is predominantly Irish – and that's carried down on the patriarchal side from Gramps and so on – but **_Babushka_** has a strong influence on the family. Hence Pa's name. And Dom too, I guess."

"Has? Not _had_?"

"Well, she's still alive and ruling a small village in rural Russia with an iron fist, so far as I know."

"Jesus, you people are like _rocks_ …" Theresa muttered.

"Genuine iron fist too, actually," he told her, honestly. "She lost a hand saving my great-uncle from a grenade when he was a kid."

"What, was he playing with it?"

"God no," Myles exclaimed. "Someone was trying to kill them. They didn't manage, of course."

"I see," she said, as though that had been the obvious answer. "So what happened with you two getting landed with your names then? They aren't exactly Russian."

He didn't need to ask which 'two' she was referring to. Despite having never seen the pair of them in the same room, Theresa still used terms like that to refer to the Butler twins. Myles wouldn't tell her, but he liked it. It made him feel like Beckett was not so far away as he might be.

"Again; maternal influence," he shrugged. "It would seem we Butler males are only attracted to strong-willed women."

"Apparently so," she smirked, raising an eyebrow. "Although I think that's the nicest way anyone has ever called me a 'stubborn bitch'."

"Well, not all Butler males. I mean, I have a second-cousin who tricked a vicar into marry him and his now-husband, who as far as I hear disguised himself with a wig and a dress and convinced my relative to go along with it."

"Butler ancestors at the forefront of same-sex marriage," Theresa raised an eyebrow. "Who knew, eh? Good on them."

"Not that good, actually. Pretty sure they had to kill a few people for their 'happily ever after' once someone found out. But needs must," Myles shrugged. "Anyway; Butler males and their history of requiring strong guidance from their partners aside, the names come from..."

"So what about you Myles? Bertha keep you inline alright or is that someone else?" Theresa smirked at him.

 _Don't make me think about my poor Bentley when she's lying under a sheet in the garage waiting for me to come and fix her... And who told you I call her... it... that? Domovoi, you little shit..._

"Anyway," he said, coughing to avoiding the awkwardness. "The names are of British origin. Mum's a Brit. Probably explains a lot."

"English?"

"A mix, as far as I know, but essentially, yeah."

"I thought the English were a bit more..." she waved her hand in an approximation of the 'royal wave'. "You know - posh and stuck up."

"Have you _met_ The Queen?" Myles asked her, raising a brow.

"No – surprisingly, I haven't," Theresa scoffed and then paused; "Wait, have you?"

"I'm not suppose to disclose that information," he said with a haughty sniff. "But _apparently_ she's quite the badass."

"Myles! You can't call _The Queen_ a _badass!_ "

"Just did," he shrugged.

"Right," she snorted. "So your mum is basically like The Queen."

"Well, she's definitely a badass who rules the roost, for a start."

Theresa smiled, punching him on the arm. He gave a dramatic wince and she shook her head.

"I missed you, you prat."

"Of course you did," Myles drawled, cockily. "I'm a big part of your life."

"Well you're a great big _something_ ," she said.

"Yeah; _idiot_ , if what you tell me so often is the truth," he mused.

"Yes, well you are," she told him. "A complete idiot. Don't you ever do something like this…"

She gestured roughly at his torso in several stabbing motions with her forefinger.

"… to me ever again, alright?"

"Ah-ah," he warned. "Come on, now. You know I have no way of promising that."

"I know, just…" she sighed. "Just be careful. Alright?"

"I was!" he protested. "If I hadn't have been, I wouldn't be sitting here now!"

"I don't know how you are, to be honest," she admitted. "And every time I start trying to think I…"

"You get it too," Myles said, looking up at her sharply. "The buzzing. And the h…"

He paused, scowling as at even the notion of the word, the pressure began building in his cranium.

"The headache. Yep."

"I don't know what it is. I don't like it."

"Did you speak to Pa about it?"

"Of course. He just said to let it go."

"Same thing as he said to me," she said, frowning. "I thought it was pretty odd. Not like him to let anything go, is it?"

"I think it's orders from **_Mamochka_** , to be honest."

"Your mother?"

"Yes. She's being… cagey. Cagier than usual, I mean. Obviously I think the world of the woman, but there's a reason me and Beckett found following orders from Ko so easy."

"She hasn't really spoken to me," Theresa admitted.

"Oh she won't," Myles shrugged. "Don't worry about it."

"But I do – what if I don't give a good impression or something?" Theresa said, worriedly. "I want her to like me."

"She does," Myles said simply.

"She's told you that?"

"Well, it's obvious really; you're not dead."

Theresa laughed but then stopped.

"You're serious?"

"Well… she'd have probably have given us some fair warning to get rid of you less permanently," he said, rubbing his hands over his freshly shaved skull. It had been something he had made a priority of. It made him feel ready for anything again. At least he _looked_ like he was. Besides, The Fowls had been surprised enough at his appearance at the manor, they didn't need to be alarmed by the _appearance_ of him too.

"But you think she _likes_ me? What's she said about me?"

Myles paused his hands halfway down his face. "Trust me – she thinks you're ok."

"Oh come on Mylo, you can tell me! You know I won't get offended or anything," she laughed. "She thinks I should work out more and learn Russian better, right?"

"Well, that too…" he said, keen to steer the conversation away. "She gave you a nickname, didn't she?"

"Yeah, why is that? What's autumn got to do with me? I mean, I don't mind, I'm just curious."

"Have you ever looked up the origin of your name, or the meaning? It'll be something to do with that. She's into her etymology and so on."

"And what else did she say about me?" Theresa said, relentless and unswerving as always.

"Ah… I don't remember. Something about thinking you weren't bad, anyway."

"Oh come on My-my – tell me!"

"Urgh – don't call me that," he scoffed. "Where've you got _that_ from? Mum only ever really calls me 'Soldier' and 'My-boy' like Pa."

"Well I heard your mother call Pa Xan-xan, the other day."

"Hmm. She normally calls him Sasha," he mused. "Or, you know, just 'dolt'."

"Just like I call you idiot or oaf, really."

"Yep."

There was a short pause where Myles (stupidly) dared to hope Theresa had dropped the subject. And then;

"So what did she say about me?"

"Goddamnit _alright_ ," he muttered. "She said if…"

He sighed and she rotated her hand encouragingly, amused as always at his awkwardness.

"She said… She said if Beckett doesn't turn up in the next couple of years we should… erm…" he stumbled around the admittance again, then deciding that the longer he took the worse it would get. "Well, you know she likes Dom a lot? She wants another copy. For insurance purposes."

Theresa snorted – although at his embarrassment or her own, Myles wasn't sure.

"And what did you say?!"

"I told her she could fuck off!" he said, hotly.

"Did you really?"

"Does it look like I'm missing an ear?" he asked, sarcastically. "No; of course I didn't _actually_ tell her to fuck off, I just told her that would be weird and she should stop trying to set up a breeding program. Dom is good enough by himself. We're lucky she hasn't kidnapped him actually."

"They do seem to get along," Theresa said. "But she's not having him. Not my boy. Not _our_ boy."

Myles smiled a little despite himself at that. Theresa would 'share' Dom with very few other people in this world and he was honoured to be one of them.

"It's ok – Pa's told her she can't. About the only argument he's won with her in about thirty years, but she's happy so long as Dom goes to Ko's and trains with her. They're quite good friends, actually; Mum and Ko. Not that that's a surprise; if you met Ko, you'd know why."

Theresa made no comment to that. Originally it was always going to be her decision whether or not Dom went to the prestigious Blue Diamond Bodyguarding Academy. But as he got older, she began to realise that if she told him he couldn't go, she would only be pushing her son away in the long run.

She sighed. "Well I'm glad she likes him, I suppose. Wouldn't want my DNA to have negatively diluted your gene pool."

"Oh no, like I say she loves the kid. As much as she does 'love', anyway. Says he's a perfect mix of me and Beckett – take from that what you will."

"Imagine an experiment where that worked out. A couple of centuries from now we could have some clones of the pair of you."

"Well why not?" he smirked. "Can't improve on perfection; may as well just repeat it."

"Idiot," she said, rolling her eyes.

"Besides, we are just natural clones; technically," Myles continued. "Our genetic material is identical. I'm not sure you can clone… whatever is on the inside that makes your personality."

"Souls, Myles. _'Souls'_ , is the word you're looking for."

"Alright then, souls," Myles shrugged. Theresa was usually more scientifically-minded than spiritual, but beliefs were complicated things, he supposed.

"Do you believe in that?"

"'Resa, I just basically woke up from the dead. And not only that, as much as Pa frets; pretty much fully functional. I don't know what to believe in anymore."

"Dom said something to me…" she started.

"Go on?"

"He told me you were dying. Before you came home, I mean."

"I thought he wasn't speaking whilst I was... you know, away."

"Well, no. He drew a picture. It's here somewhere..."

She rootled in her long, cardigan pocket and produced a carefully folded piece of paper, flattening it out to reveal a crayoned drawing and handing it to him.

Myles physically leaned back at the sight of it.

It was of two identical stick men, holding hands in front of a horizontally-stretched oval, scribbled in blue. The colour stretched up to the top right corner of the page, winding a thin path between scrawled, dark green trees...

"I asked him about it again this afternoon and he told me that's supposed to be you and his dad. Fuck knows why he drew that," she shrugged. "Kids are weird, I guess. You OK, Myles?"

"Yeah," Myles said, off-handedly, passing the paper back. "I just... I don't want him to think Beck's dead, is all."

"I don't know if he does. I asked him where you were supposed to be and he just said 'by a pond near a forest'," she said, nonchalantly. "He's lost interest in it since you've come back. He said you were definitely dying and it must have been… Don't laugh at him, ok?"

"'Course not," he assured her, still feeling very unsettled by the drawing.

"He says he thinks it was his Christmas wish coming true. That you were going to die and you miraculously got better because he wished it on a piece of metal that Pa stuck in a Christmas pudding a month ago. Yes, I know – silly. But he's seven. What's my excuse for believing in some sort of miracle? Some sort of… magic?"

The word was like a match being struck in the dark. Images flashed in his mind's eye and he forgot about his nephew's drawing for a moment.

The buzzing started up in his head and he closed his eyes. She did the same, pinching the bridge of her nose and making a small hiss of pain. He merely scowled, images rushing through his head.

 _Blood pouring from holes in his chest._

 _His father's face looming down over him, his mouth moving but the sound distorted and far away._

 _Beckett._

 _The pool._

 _And Beckett._

 _And the pool..._

 _The beeping of the machines._

 _The rush of adrenaline._

 _The scratchy sheets of the hospital bed._

 _Theresa, Dom, his father, the Fowls…_

 _Falling to the floor when he tried to walk…_

 _The pain._

 _The **pain!**_

 _Then the mirrored walls._

 _The eerie lighting._

 _His mother._

 _The stranger._

 _The sparks._

 ** _Blue_** _sparks…_

The buzzing became a thin whine and he gritted his teeth against it.

"You _were_ dying," Theresa said, suddenly. She remembered the paperwork. Remembered trying to contact her old mentor – the one she had been practicing medicine illicitly under – mostly on various underworld bodyguards; bodyguards like Beckett had been when she met him. Long before she knew Myles. Long before she had Dom. Her mind grasped onto the alternative subject instantly and her head filled with images of Beckett and their son, the pain fading as they whirled and flashed by, like scenes on the other side of a train window. But something snagged, the photo reel juttering and sticking on an image of Dom flopped down over his uncle's chest – bandaged and bleeding – on a hospital bed…

"Ah! My head!" she groaned, pressing her palms to her temples.

Beside her, Myles was doing the same, his breathing coming in short, sharp bursts as he fought it.

"Think of something else," she said, quickly. "Anything."

"Like what?" he growled.

"What did you get Dom for Christmas?"

"Gun holster. I told you," he said, through gritted teeth. "And a suit. But that's fucked now. I'll get him another one."

"I got him trainers… oww… god…"

He reached for her hand suddenly and she grasped his tightly – as tightly as she had a little over seven years ago when he had sat, not quite willingly, with her in the maternity ward.

"What else did you get him?" Myles asked her.

"Gloves," she growled. "For his Saturday class."

"Thought he wasn't going to that anymore?"

"Ah yeah. Probably can't show my face in there after what you did the other week."

"Not my fault," he demurred.

"No, it wasn't actually," she said, the room steadying around her as the high-pitched whine faded away in face of her distracted thoughts.

"Can I get that on paper?" he said, letting out a sigh as his brain began to grudgingly believe he was no longer in pursuit of his missing memories.

"Me? Saying something wasn't your fault?" Theresa asked. "Never."

They suddenly realised their hands were still entwined and she silently thanked him for squeezing her fingers gently before he let go and not ripping his hand back as though he had been burnt. They had changed over the years; changed together. She didn't want to imagine a life without him and if that meant not trying to fathom what had happened so that she didn't have to face that prospect, she was just going to have to do as Pa had said and 'let it go'.

"I don't think we're going to remember this in the morning, are we?"

"No," he said, as the thoughts he was trying to focus on swirled and vanished like mist in a breeze. "But maybe we're not supposed to."

"We'll just believe in magic for one night then, agreed?"

"I'll believe in anything so long as I can keep on doing what I do."

"And what's that then? Jumping in front of bullets?"

"Protecting," he said. "Artemis, Dom… you. The only thing that kept me going. The only reason I fought to live."

 _I could have stayed,_ he thought, staring at the picture Dom had drawn. _I could've stayed with Beckett..._

For some reason that thought was immune to whatever was causing the pain in his head.

"Sappy git," she said, the buzzing fading the further they strayed from the subject of unexplained miracles. "Must read too many schmoozy novels."

"And who's fault is that then, I wonder?" he accused.

"Hey, I merely provide the opportunity; you chose the action."

Myles restrained himself from rolling his eyes. "I'm going to bed before my head explodes."

"From the buzzing or the constant onslaught of teasing?"

"Both!" he groaned, pushing himself up off the sofa.

"Wait up, I'll come too," she said, leaping up much less stiffly than his muscles could currently manage and beginning to turn off the lights in the room.

"Not to my bed you won't," he grumbled. "I want a good night's sleep without you wriggling around every five minutes, snoring in my ear…"

"Myles, _Myles_ ," she drawled. "And how would you know I do that, eh? Same way I know you're a sucker for cuddle, little spoon?"

"Oh can it, would you?" he muttered. "You'll get Mum's hopes up carrying on like that…"

She laughed and they took the stairs together, leaving the fathoms of miracles for another night.

* * *

 **Well, it's New Year all around the world now, so here's to it. I hope 2019 is good to you.**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**


	16. Chapter 15 - Housekeeping

**Thanks to:** ** _Fowl Fox, Hartemis Shipper, Jolinnn_ and ****_Steinbock_.**

 **WARNINGS: Gruff!Fluff. Much of it. Also, this is the penultimate chapter. Only the Epilogue to go. Last chance to get your name on the reviewer roll call before Wolfy goes back into posting hibernation once more...**

 **Apologies for entirely miss-timing this fic. I could've lined it up properly with the real-life dates if I had got my act together, but alas, I'm not that organised.**

 **Enjoy some more classic PG!**

* * *

 **CHAPTER FIFTEEN**

 **HOUSEKEEPING**

 _ **Definition: The management of household or business affairs to facilitate productive work**_

 **The Grounds of Fowl Manor, Dublin**

"Now then, my little demon," she said, as they walked across the wide, snowy expanse together towards the woods.

He smiled up at her. "Yes, Granny?"

He was young and innocent. It wouldn't last and, though she wouldn't admit it, she found it almost… _endearing_.

She sighed and he cocked his head at her. Then again, she had just spent the past ten-minutes throwing a ball for him to retrieve, so she could hardly blame the boy for acting a little dog-like.

"What is it?" he asked.

"I need to ask you a favour."

Dom frowned. A favour? Him?

"Anything," he said, with such utter honesty that even her stone heart rattled a little. He meant it. She would have to hone that absolute loyalty. In the wrong hands it would cause him a lot of trouble in the future.

"I'm going to tell you a secret and I need you to keep it. I need you not to tell your mother, not to tell Pa and _definitely_ not to tell your Uncle Myles. Do you understand?"

He nodded, confused, but well-trained enough to wait for clarification rather than start asking countless questions.

"Do you believe in magic, boy?"

Dom paused before he answered. Was this a trick question? Should he say 'no' so that he seemed more grown-up? Or should he tell the truth? She had always taught him to tell the truth. To her, anyway.

"Answer me honestly. You know I can't abide liars," she warned, in timely remindence.

"Yeah… a bit," he mumbled.

"And why is that?" she asked.

"Well… nothing's ever proved to me it ain't real," he shrugged.

"Very good answer," she nodded, pleased.

"And…" he started, but faltered, realising he hadn't been asked to provide further explanation.

"Go on," she said.

"And well… Uncle was properly gonna die. I could tell. Nobody told me, but I knew it. Mam and Pa talked about it and I listened in on them. And Uncle was all… weak. Like his energy was all leaking out of him. Like flooding out. And nobody could stop it."

"You're a very perceptive little soul, Domovoi," she said.

Dom wasn't sure if that was a compliment, but he continued anyway.

"And he's not like that now. He's all better. And I wished it for my Christmas wish – from the pudding, you know?"

"Well you are partly right," she said. "But it wasn't the pudding."

"Oh," he said, confused. "Well what was it then?"

"A combination of comings-together and a few people that owe me favours," she said cryptically.

"It was you?!" he gasped.

"Not as such. I'm no witch – although your father and uncle may beg to differ at times – but there are some things that most people cannot understand. Those things need to be kept hidden. They need to be kept out of sight or they will be exploited, do you understand?"

"What's exp… explited?" he asked, frowning.

" _Exploited_ , Little Kingdom. And in this case, it means they will be hunted down, have their technology stolen and ultimately be wiped out."

"Oh. OK I get it," he said, although that was a loose statement at best.

"Not entirely, you don't," she said. "But one day I will not be here to act as guardian and someone must be there in my place."

"Guard what, Granny?" he asked.

But she didn't answer. Instead she strode on towards a great oak – quite possibly the oldest organism on the grounds – her grandson trailing in her wake.

"Sit for a minute, child," she said, once she reached the base of the huge trunk, folding her legs under herself, despite the cold ground. There was no snow here, only dry leaves and frozen mulch.

He flopped down beside her, obediently, with the strangest feeling that she had picked this exact spot above all others on the grounds. They sat silently for several minutes, until Dom closed his eyes and listened to the birds and the wind in the trees and felt so drowsy he thought he could hear the distant thudding of drums… Probably his heartbeat in his ears. _Right?_

He looked over at his grandmother. Her eyes were closed and he wondered if she was meditating. Pa did that sometimes. Said he needed to 'recharge more often now the batteries are getting on a bit'. He taught Dom how to do it too. Not quite sleep, but rest. For the mind and the body. The boy had not quite mastered it yet; he always heard something or thought of something too intriguing for him to stay still for long. So for now he looked at his grandmother instead. She looked no different to when he had last seen her; though he didn't see her very often. The last time she had visited he had been almost five. Before that, he was three and a half. He didn't remember the first time she had seen him – he had been only a baby. But he did remember meeting Artemis's grandparents for the first time and thinking they were vastly less interesting and unusual than his own - and that he was grateful for that fact.

"The people I knew helped me," she said, suddenly. "Because I helped them once. And to an extent, I help them every day. It's a very hard job, because I must tell nobody about it. Not even your grandpa – and that is hardest of all. But I will tell you one day, my little house demon. I will tell you. You are my chosen one. You will be the next to guard it."

"Guard what, Granny?" he asked again, even though it meant repeating himself, which she hated.

"This, dear boy," she said, patting the ground between them. " _This_."

"Oh!" he said, his face lighting up. "I get it now!"

"You do?" she raised an eyebrow, quite surprised at his certainty and perceptiveness.

"Yeah. You mean, like guarding the Earth?"

"Sort of," she sighed. _Maybe not._

"Did I get it?" he asked, face hopeful.

"You will," she said, with a rare smile.

He grinned at her and for a moment she saw only her sons as little boys and wondered, as all mothers do – even she - if she had done right by them.

"Can you throw the ball for me again now, please?" he asked. "My legs have gone cold."

She looked him straight in the eye for a few more moments, seeing him for himself, now. Her grandson; a mix of everything she held dear – and a little extra. His eyes were just like that of his father's – and his uncle's, of course – and his grandfather's before that. He was young and ready for life.

"Go on then," she said, launching the ball into the undergrowth.

He raced after it, as happy as a spaniel and she sighed. He had so much to learn. But she would be there to teach him. He would not always be aware of it, but she would be there.

And although he never asked again about his uncle's miraculous recovery, or of magic, or of mysterious guarding duties, he was endowed with a knowledge not to ask and a lingering belief of the out of the ordinary which would serve him very well in the future.

Him, and quite a few others indeed.

* * *

Theresa wandered the grounds. She was not 'searching' so much as she was 'looking', but her heartrate had begun to speed up a little when she did not find her son in any of his usual haunts.

Finally she found footprints - a pair of, she thought, though there was one set running all over the place. She followed them in the crisp snow towards the woodland where she - not being trained in the art of tracking, that was - lost the trail and stood, listening for a moment to the few birds that had braved the cold to sing in the leafless trees.

"Looking for something, Autumn girl?"

She jumped, inhaling sharply at the voice.

"What are you…" she began, then spotted her son asleep in the lap of the woman who was all but a stranger to her. "Dom!"

"Hush," Maud said, raising a finger to her lips. "He's sleeping."

"Did you give him something?" she accused with a frown, stepping towards them over the leaf-litter.

Maud gave a small snort. "Is that you talking? Or my dear youngest?"

"Both – he's told me enough about you," Theresa said, somewhat grimly.

"Yet I have heard little more of you, than the fact that he holds you in high regard," the older woman mused. "Who are you, Theresa Brady?"

"I'm the mother of your grandson," she said, cagily. "What did you give him?"

Maud eyed her, as though she was about to reprimand her for her woefully incomplete answer. But she relented. The girl had caught her in a soft mood.

"Exercise," she said, simply. "He's just worn out. No doubt in an hour he'll be bouncing around the manor again like a frog on springs. Now what is it you wanted to ask me?"

"What? Nothing. I didn't come to ask you anything; I came looking for Dom."

"Yes. And now you have found him, and subsequently myself, and now you wish to ask me something. Now sit down. Don't lie to me, girl; it is futile."

"Yes," Theresa sighed, lowering herself to the ground next to the pair. "Myles told me that, too."

Maud almost chuckled at that. "And rightly so."

They sat in companionable silence for a while. Dom snuffled slightly in his sleep and Theresa reached over a hand to smooth his forehead.

"How did you do it?" she said eventually.

"Do what?"

"You know what I mean," she said, giving the Butler matriarch a sideways glance.

Maud did know. She shrugged.

"Would it help if I called it witchcraft?"

"No," said Theresa. "I'd prefer the scientific explanation."

"There isn't one," she said, simply. "Magic, is the answer."

"I'm never going to find out, am I?" she sighed.

"I doubt it. In fact, I would hope against it. And if we can come to an agreement now that that will be the case, then I would be much more content to leave this place."

"You're leaving?"

"Not so much 'leaving' as I was only ever 'passing through'."

"But Pa – Butler, I mean – he misses you."

"I know," she said, as though that was the end of it.

"He misses you…" she paused, not quite willing to admit the thought to the strange woman. "He misses you the way I miss Beckett."

"And how is that?" she asked, seemingly interested for the first time in their conversation.

"Like… Like I'm scared he's never coming back. Like the only thing that could put things right is to be back in his arms. Like I know he's out there somewhere, but I'll never know where..." she petered off, breathing the icy air so heavily through her nose it stung. "Need I go on?"

"Touching, that you care about my son that way," Maud said to her. "But I really don't think Sasha is quite so poetic about it."

"He still misses you," Theresa said, stubbornly. "And you're not even dead."

"Nor is Beckett, as far as we are aware."

"Would we know?" she asked. "He's been gone a long time."

"Seven years is not such a long time."

"That's easy for you to say when you'd have only seen him, what, twice in that time?" Theresa said hotly. "He's legally dead."

"He's not dead," Maud said with such certainty that it riled Theresa.

"Are you telling me you know he's alive somewhere? Because I swear, if you know where he is, I'll…"

"You'd what, girl?" the Butler matriarch seemed nothing but _amused_ by her outburst.

"Sorry," Theresa mumbled after a moment. "It's just… a touchy subject."

"I know. Don't think you're the only one who has been searching for him all this time."

Theresa sniffed, rubbing her hand across her eyes. "How do we even know if he's alive?"

"I would know if he wasn't," the man's mother said, staring out over the manor grounds.

"But _how?_ " she asked again.

"Wouldn't you, if it were Domovoi?" Maud said, simply.

Theresa said nothing, but her fingers pressed a little more heavily into her son's hair. She'd like to think so.

"The matter still at hand," Maud continued, as though there had been no subject switch. "Is whether you, with all your science and knowledge, are able to… how shall we put it? – _'let this one slide'_ , in terms of finding an explanation for Myles's miraculous return to health?"

Theresa was silent; thinking. The question had caught her off-guard and her head was still filled of thought of the other Butler twin. Of her Beckett.

"And if I don't?"

There was a sudden and well-timed 'crack' in the undergrowth and she sat up, stiff with the alertness of a spooked deer. Maud eyed the dusk like a predator with a growl just caught in its throat, waiting to warn off the intruder. No more sounds came from the bushes.

"I cannot say," she said, looking away. "But I really would prefer you to just be thankful and move on. Do you think you can manage that?"

"Have you spoken to Myles?"

"Of course."

"And what did he say?"

"Much the same as you, actually. Are you sure he wouldn't be a fair replacement for Beckett?"

"Mylo? No," Theresa laughed, softly. "Believe me, I've... I've actually tried."

The admittance made her cringe a little, but there was no such embarrassment on the older woman's face, only simple examination of the facts. This was good news in her utilitarian viewpoint.

"Then maybe you should try again," she said simply. "You're very good for him. As he is for you."

"I know," Theresa agreed with her. "And honestly I think I'm ready to... move on sounds so harsh but..."

The Butler woman said nothing, waiting for her to continue.

She took a deep breath and did so: "Myles is just too… He's too…"

She waved her hand with a huff of frustration, appealing to the older woman with a facial expression somewhere between exasperation and disappointment.

"You needn't find the words," his mother sighed in return. "I know their meaning."

They sat together in silence once more, contemplating the impossible enigma that was a Butler.

"What are your beliefs on love?" Maud said, after a little while.

"Oh," Theresa said, taken aback by the strangely worded question. "I don't know... I..."

"For example, do you believe I love my husband?"

Theresa stalled slightly. "Yes?"

"Was that a statement, or a question?" Maud said, quirking her mouth slightly.

"I mean, you must - right? He clearly loves you."

"That he does," she agreed. "And it is returned. I am not so cold-hearted as you think; I love Xan very, very much. But in my own way. As Myles loves you, in his own way."

"Oh, I don't know..."

"Believe me, Autumn Girl. I know my boys inside out, no matter how unreadable they believe themselves to be. He cares about you very much; he loves you."

Theresa sighed. "Well I wish he knew that."

Maud actually let out a chuckle. "If he would let himself, I at least believe he would not be such a bad replacement for his brother."

"But if... when... Beckett comes back..." she stumbled over the sentence.

"A stand-in, then. You would cross that bridge when you came to it, if at all," the Butler said. "There is no point in living for 'maybes'. Live for the now. It could all be over in a moment, surely you know that by now?"

Theresa nodded, silently. Of course she did.

"Besides, if Myles is so squeamish about the physical side of a relationship, he should at least be able to perform his duties once a year or so to further the cause."

"What bloody cause?!" Theresa said, half-amused, half-offended. And cocurrently trying to decide whether or not to _mortify_ her friend by repeating this conversation to him later.

"I need at least another heir - preferably more. And from your genetics would be perfectly acceptable if this little monster is anything to go by," she said, stroking her grandson's head gently.

Theresa laughed - she wasn't quite comfortable with the fact she was clearly being referred to as merely part of a greater breeding program plan of the Butler matriach, but she knew better than to let it offend her. "I'm still learning - but I supposed that's your version of a compliment?"

"Very much so," Maud said. "And really, do you suppose Myles will find another human female he will so much as speak to beyond business terms? No, you are my best hope. Or else Domovoi is my only hope."

"Thank-you?"

"You're welcome. Of course, if Dom was useless we would not be having this conversation. As it is, I merely need a spare. A male would be best, but I would be willing to work with a strong female, it just causes such a delay later on for the next generation..."

"You mean you would have made me and him... disappear?" Theresa said, with a raised eyebrow. "If he was not what you wanted?"

"You are indeed learning," said Maud. "If it helps to settle your mind, you are now under my protection. Permanently. You will have no problems with people from... our world."

Theresa knew what she meant. The Butler family had a great many enemies - a lot of them courtesy of the Fowls.

"Of course, you are free to make as many ordinary enemies as you like. But I can assure you, anyone so much as looking your way because of your connection to our family will be... dealt with."

The weight of that protection was like a heavy cloak. Pa had always promised her the same, of course, but for some reason she believed his wife even more.

She was still uneasy about the memory-loss thing. There was definitely something going on there. But what it was...

"I'll let it go," Theresa said, eventually. "Whatever it is you did to get Myles home and well. I don't even really know what I'm even agreeing to 'let go' of or why, but I will. I won't ask any more questions about it. I'll just be grateful that I still have one Butler twin with me to look out for."

Maud smiled at her genuinely. She had said that the right way around, too.

"Thank-you," she said. "Both for your acceptance, and for looking after my boys. They need us more than they think."

"You got that right," Theresa said, wryly, feeling a warm sense of comradery with the otherwise aloof woman. "I'm sorry I thought you were a... well, you know."

"And I apologise for mistaking you for a housekeeper."

Maud moved, gently but swiftly to her feet, somehow quite efficiently transferring the boy on her lap to Theresa's so that she was trapped by the slumber of her son.

"Where are you going?"

"On," Maud said, beginning to walk away. "I am needed elsewhere."

"You're needed _here_ – you just said it yourself!"

"Yes," she said, turning back with a smile and for a moment the winter sunset lit her up in a way which made Theresa believe for just a moment that maybe the woman was magical in some way after all. "But not as much. My boys will be fine. They have eachother. And, well, they have _you_."

Theresa felt a strange mix of embarrassment and responsibility.

"When will you be back?"

"Someday," said Maud Butler as she disappeared into the undergrowth.

"Wait!" Theresa said, struggling to her feet much less gracefully than she had.

Something – her shout, her movement – disturbed Dom and he scrunched up his face, rubbing his eyes and blinking blearily up at her.

"Mama?" he said, yawning. "Where did you come from? I was with Granny… where is she?"

"She went," Theresa said, softly, still staring at the place she had last seen the woman.

"Where?" asked the boy.

"I don't know, baby," she admitted.

"Oh," he said, a little sadly.

She stroked his hair.

"Are you ok?"

"Yeah, I'm good," he said, sitting up.

"Promise?" she said, grabbing his shoulders suddenly. "Promise me?"

He looked at her with those deep blue eyes – eyes which had seen far too much for their years – and smiled at her, a little confused.

"Promise," he repeated, crossing his little finger over his heart.

* * *

 **Argh the gruff!fluff. I did say.**

 **How'd that read? Alright? Maud (aka Poison Granny) and Theresa needed that heart to heart, but I think maybe it should've been shorter and behind the scenes but hey, brutally honest PG strikes again haha**

 **Wolfy**  
 **ooo**  
 **O**

 **03/01/19**


	17. Epilogue

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 **I hope you got as much enjoyment out of reading this as I did out of writing it. Thank-you so much for taking the time to let me know that you were reading along. It really is the only thing that keeps me posting instead of writing it and keeping this all to myself. Hell, it probably wouldn't even make it out of my head, if I'm honest. So yeah, here's to you guys.**

 **WARNINGS: This is it, the final chapter. Of this fic, anyway. Enjoy!**

* * *

 **EPILOGUE**

 **'ULTIMATE'**

 **Definition: _The final, or best example of its kind_**

 **Fowl Manor, Dublin**

Xandr had not seemed surprised when she told him that his wife had left without so much as a goodbye.

"Yes, she does that," he said, in plain acceptance, swirling suds over the plates in the dishwater.

"But _why?"_ Theresa asked, as she dried the washed ones. It had been a few hours since their chat in the woodland and she had put Dom to bed, before coming to break the news it had seemed the Butler patriarch had already known.

"She doesn't like goodbyes," Myles chipped in. "Never has. You're lucky she even told you she was going. Normally she's just here for breakfast one minute and you turn around to offer her the milk and she's gone."

"It doesn't bother you?" Theresa asked both of them.

"You get used to it," Xandr sighed. "She'll be back."

"She said some strange stuff. Out in the woods, I mean."

"Stranger than usual?" Myles snorted, taking the last plate she had finished drying and putting it back in the cupboard. On a high shelf, Theresa noticed with an internal eye-roll as he closed the door on the crockery. She had been trying to train him to leave them lower down so she could reach them without resorting to the indignity of getting a chair. It had taken her months of constant daily nagging to get Beckett to conform, so she didn't hold out much hope on that front.

"If she was here she'd clout you for saying that," she said instead, deciding to leave the full recounting of the conversation she had had with Maud for a later date.

"Ah well, my ears are safe from cauliflowering for another wee while," Myles said with a shrug, noticing his job as 'putter away' was finished.

"Not if I follow my orders to _look out for you_ ," Theresa smirked, raising a hand threateningly.

"She told you to do that?" he scoffed, kicking out a chair from under the table and sitting down heavily onto it. "Bloody hell; I am screwed."

He rolled his eyes at her, pulling _that_ face - the one no Fowl would ever catch more than a glimpse of. The unprofessional one. The snarking, smirking, 'suck on that' face. The one that only appeared when he was as 'off duty' as it was possible for him to get. The side of The Major that was _Myles_.

His eyes glinted at her, bright with mischief, baiting her for a response to that comment.

Maud was right. She did love him.

Maybe she should have some sort of conversation with him.

Or rather, she would talk and he would valiantly try to avoid giving any sort of response...

"Ungrateful shite," she tutted, flicking the tea-towel at the back of his head so that it snapped loudly.

 _Hmm_ , thought Xandr, watching them. Inflicting minor pain before she got too emotional? - perhaps she wasn't quite as much of a stranger in the family as it first appeared.

"Ow," Myles muttered, rubbing at the base of his skull. "You don't have to take her word for word, you know that right?"

"I do. I just like beating you up a little."

"I'm still recuperating, in case you'd forgotten," he groused.

"Only when it suits you," his father drawled, holding his hand out for the towel. Theresa handed it to him and Myles was glad – having been on the receiving end of his father's version of a tea-towel snapping before – that the man merely used it to dry off his hands. "Don't think I haven't noticed you've been down in the garage."

"I... I had to at least _look_..." he said, trying to block the traumatic mental image of the state of his beloved Bentley, laid under a sheet in the mechanic workshop. It would be easier to scrap her, but if his father had his way, he would have some more downtime than usual to start fixing her up again. An evening project to keep him from getting bored.

"Aaand the gym," Xandr continued, raising an eyebrow.

"Just… easing myself back into some light exercise," Myles said, meekly – if that was possible for such a giant. "Stretches and so on..."

" _Rest_ ," Xandr said firmly. "Until the month's over."

"Tomorrow then," Myles said. "Excellent."

" _Next_ month," Alexandr corrected him dryly.

"Until February? Are you joking? What am I going to do sat around on my arse for four weeks?" his son complained, for all the world like the grounded teenager he once was. "I can't fix the car all day and make it last that long!"

"Oh I'm sure we can find you something," Theresa smiled. "We could go somewhere - I'll take Dom out of school on trauma grounds. Spin some story or other. School never does anything for the first few weeks of the year anyway."

"Seriously? And what are you going to do about work?"

"Oh don't you worry about that," Xandr said with a growling chuckle. "I'm paying her to be your minder."

"My _minder_? Jesus Christ…" Myles muttered.

"Yes. Since you so obviously need one," said his father. "Now where would you like to go? Home or away?"

"I'm not going anywhere," he grumbled.

"Home then," Theresa said. "Fair enough. Saves all the passport palaver at borders."

"Why do I feel like I'm being ganged up on here?"

"Your mother posted orders before she left. Rest and rehab. Besides that; you need to lie low for a reasonable amount of time that people don't ask too many questions. She may have been able to get away with vouching for us three and the boy, but not even my Maud can convince her friends of much more than that."

"I'm not going to ask about the _friends_ ," Myles said, wisely. "But I am going to ask; what the hell was she thinking ordering me to take a _holiday_?"

"Ah come on – it'll be fun!" Theresa grinned. "Dom will love it, at least."

Myles sighed. He wasn't getting out of this one.

And, if he let himself admit it, after the last time he had thought he 'wasn't getting out of' a situation, he couldn't pretend he wasn't just a _tiny_ bit pleased…

"Oh alright. Let him pick what we do then. So long as it's not bloody Disney Land…"

"Disney Land?" she snorted. "Do you even _know_ your nephew?"

"Alright," he grouched. "I suppose at least I can trust him to pick something exciting…"

"Ah-ah," she warned. "No excitement. Mundane, dreary activities only. I'm thinking… Renting a VW, going around the country looking at castle ruins."

"In January? Do you _want_ us all to catch hypothermia? May as well go camping. In Scotland. Least there's no midgies at this time of year…"

"Spain then. Spain's always hot – right? I know someone over there, if I can get hold of him…"

"I told you - I don't want to travel…" he grumbled.

"To hell with what _you_ want – if you won't take a holiday then I'll drag you on mine. Spas, quiet retreats…"

Myles sighed loudly. "Well there's not a snowball's chance in hell you're going to get both of us to agree to that. You're outnumbered."

" _I'm_ in charge. Your parents _both_ said so."

"Then Dom and I will be staging a mutiny…" Myles said, firmly.

"Ach - Dom's a mummy's boy – he'll agree with whatever I say…"

"Oh _really_ – let's test that theory, shall we? When I put 'shooting range' up against your 'jacuzzi day'."

"Ha – got you. Shooting range then. Followed by a hot tub spa. You can sit in a sauna or something while Dom does forty thousand laps of a pool. Actually – massage would be really good for your rehab…"

"Not a _chance_ …"

Xandr leant back on the kitchen counter and folded his arms with a smile. His Maud may be gone again for the time being, but between keeping these two from killing eachother and raising the next greatest Blue Diamond the world had ever seen, he had plenty to keep him on his toes. As he watched them bickering back and forth and thought of his grandson - no doubt not _quite_ keeping out of trouble with the Fowl boy at present, he was reminded to be grateful for what he had.

" _Muuum_!"

An unusual cry in the Fowl household, all three adults looked over to the door.

Dom dutifully burst through it, two more children a little slower behind, pausing at the threshold.

"Have you seen my hat? Me, Artemis and Sophia are going to have a snowball fight."

He had quite recovered from his mutism, his family were pleased to hear, although Artemis did wish it had an 'on / off' switch for when he was reading a book in the manor library and the Butler boy - under advice from his grandfather to 'act interested in what your charge does' - launched into a series of twenty questions about the tome.

"Coat rack," Myles and Theresa said in unison.

"And _are_ you now?" Alexandr added. "Have you asked Mister Fowl?"

"Sophia's parents have given her permission and Father said I was allowed to go out in the grounds if I stay within the walls and take a Butler with me," the Fowl heir assured him. "And Junior..."

"Is a Butler. Very clever, young sir," Xandr drawled, resigning the rest of his day to making sure the offspring of rich people didn't loose fingers to frostbite.

"I'll watch," Myles offered instantly. This meant a temporary release from house arrest, he could feel it.

His father raised an eyebrow at him and Myles suddenly felt as young as the three children who had _already_ gained permission from their parents. Although in reality, Domovoi hadn't even bothered to ask. He knew the answer would be affirmative to almost anything that wasn't overly dangerous or illegal... well...

"Fine," the Butler patriarch sighed shortly. "Theresa - go with them for me, I'm rely on your judgement for when they're to come in."

"Yes sir," Theresa gave him a lazy salute, heading for the cupboard their boots where stacked in.

The children cheered, Dom rushing forward to grab his uncle by the arm.

"Bagsie Uncle on my team!"

"That is categorically unfair - there must be at least one Butler per team. Besides, I pay him to be on my side."

"Your _dad_ pays him to be on your side - and he's off-duty!"

"Stop arguing, boys," Theresa said, in full 'mum' mode. "One of you will have to be with me and Sophia."

She eyed her son sternly and he scuffed his feet.

" _Alright_..."

Myles stuffed a hat over his ears and wondered if he should play the 'sick' card after all. They were going to get _stuffed_.

"On second thoughts, I do rather like the idea of children versus adults, if we're all agreed?" Artemis said tactically, realising that perhaps he had scuppered his chances by leaving himself 2:3 against his favour with only an injured bodyguard to back him up.

"Good plan - I'll pick our position," said Sophia, opening the back door. "I was going to call Bates to join in, but if we're staying as age teams, I won't bother."

"He can be reinforcements for our opponents when we merrily trounce them!" Artemis said excitedly, following her out and calling over his shoulder. "Coming, Junior?"

"Sorry Mum," Domovoi grinned and the three of them disappeared into the garden. He was not quite so sure about the 'merrily trounce' part of the phrasing, but he was willing to put up a good fight.

"Good - nobody should be encouraging Bates to do anything outside in this weather on that chest," Xandr said, with a frown.

"And what about me?" asked Myles with a snort.

"You're _my_ son," Xandr shrugged. "Firstly; your blood is part antifreeze by genetics. Secondly; I don't have to fill in any forms if you're dying of pneumonia in a week."

"Charming."

"Besides - you offered," Theresa pointed out.

"I said I'd _watch_..." Myles protested, shrugging his jacket on.

"Ah come on, krampus!" Theresa said, every bit as mischievously as her son. "It'll be fun!"

"Fun? Oh yes, let's all throw lumps of compressed, frozen water at eachother until someone ends up in tears. We'll I can tell you now, it's _not_ going to be me," he grumbled as she pushed him first out of the door. " _Fun_ indee...!"

A well-aimed snowball thudded squarely into his forehead with a solid _whumph_! and there was very little debate in his mind as to who had thrown in.

His nephew beamed at him from the snowy gardens and threw himself behind a low-walled plant border.

He shook the snow from his brow and scraped the waiting handful from the ledge by the door.

 _Right then, you little..._

Screams of delight and pleas for mercy flew like the snowy missiles through the cold, December air as flakes began to fall from the darkening sky in whirling flurries.

Xandr shut the door behind them with a comforting thud against the cold and watched from behind the safety of the thick glass of the kitchen window.

It wouldn't be long before they'd burst back in, red faces and pink handed, breath misting before them, coats dampening as the snowflakes melted in the warmth from the Aga cooker. He crossed over to the iron beast, feeding it and stoking the fire in its belly, placing a large, metal kettle on top. They'd want brews when they came in. Hot chocolates, maybe - his speciality - as a treat.

The night was drawing in. The game would be shortlived. The day, like the year, was coming to a close.

Heading into the New Year was always a strange feeling. He would normally say the clocks on the wall made no difference to him, but the fact that they were very lucky indeed this time to be facing the turn of the annum together, brought the gravity of the pages on the calendar a little more into focus.

With any luck, they'd all be here again this time next year too. _More_ of them, if he had his way. Perhaps this would be the year Beckett returned. The year Maud finally settled down. The year that Theresa finally decided to come live full time at the manor. The ultimate goals in his life.

None of those things were any more likely than the other, he knew. But a man could dream. Even a weathered old bodyguard like him.

Dream on, and who knew what could happen? With a bit of luck, plenty of trained, dependable ability and perhaps – if one squinted sideways a little and ignored the scientific screaming of the unprovably undeniable – just a little bit of… _magic._

 **THE END… _for now_**

* * *

 **And if you want to imagine the final scene how it plays out in my head, then pan forward from behind Xandr, out of the window he's looking out of and into the garden, then zoom up and away from the snowball fight, backwards through an upstairs window through the middle of Mr and Mrs Fowl who are watching the others playing in the snow. And play 'Merry Christmas Everyone' by Shaking Stevens in the background. Blackout. Cue rolling credits.**

 **So. The End, as it says. For now. And as much as I'd very much like to write Myles, Theresa and Dom's little getaway break to a Centre Parks or the likes, I know I haven't really got the time. So if that does turn up, it'll probably just be a chapter in Lil Rems. What I should really be doing is focusing on the sequel to Just Reckoning. You may be pleased to hear I have everything plotted out for the second and third part of that series. You'll be less pleased to know I have absolutely no time to write it. But after this one and hearing all the fantastic reviews from you guys - even on chapters I didn't think were very good - I now have the motivation. The best Christmas present any of you could have given me.**

 **So yeah. We all know it's probably going to be the better part of a year before you hear from me again - maybe more, no promises! So I just want to take a moment here to say I hope it's a good'un for all of you.**

 **Until next time...**

 **Your resident Butler family writer,**

 **Wolfy  
ooo  
O**


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